Sir, – The Marlin Luanda tanker was ablaze in the Gulf of Aden last week following an attack by Houthi forces using an anti-ship ballistic missile. It is not the first time oil has been used as a lethal weapon in these waters. I vividly recall the 1991 Gulf oil slick which almost destroyed Saudi Arabia’s desalination plants.
There have been several other “near-misses” since then. In 2015, an abandoned tanker was left drifting off Yemen before a million barrels of oil were eventually drained from its tanks. The United Nations reported that “a floating time bomb” had been defused, preventing “a potentially enormous environmental and health disaster”.
Unfortunately hostilities in Gaza have reverberated in the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and the Arabian Gulf, with potentially terrible consequences for people and the environment. The area is famous for its biodiversity of marine life: corals, fish, invertebrates, highly productive seaweeds, sea grasses, mangroves, endangered turtles, dugong (sea cows) and other endangered species, including thousands of sea birds.
Up to 100,000 waders died as a result of the 1991 spill. Approximately 50 endangered dugongs and several times as many dolphins were found dead on Arabian beaches. Just when Saudi Arabia is planning to capitalise on its natural resources, war threatens the very basis of its unique attractions. These coral seas can only take so much before their richly productive waters lose the battle to survive. The use of oil pollution as a weapon is already intensifying the threats to life on our planet. – Yours, etc,
PETER VINE,
Clifden,
Co Galway.