Accidents happen, the saying goes.
And as last Wednesday's oil spill in English Bay amply demonstrated, accidents also happen in shipping.
The oil spill that washed up on Vancouver beaches Thursday can't be described as massive or catastrophic. And thousands of ships come and go without a crisis.
But it is bad. And it is instructive.
A number of the black marks left behind won't be from the goopy, tarry mess left on rocks or dabbled in by birds - they'll be from questions that were still unanswered a day after the spill was first noticed.
Chief among those is why it took about 12 hours for all relevant authorities and the public to be told that a spill had even happened.
And that has left a bad taste in a lot of mouths around here.
When accidents happen, people expect to be told. It also makes pragmatic sense to do so - when information is shared, everyone can be better prepared.
But we really question all the hyperbole from politicians and some citizens. When you have ships filled with fuel, there is a chance that there will be spills. Yes, everybody gets upset when that happens, but it will happen. And it will, despite even "world-class" cleanups, kill birds, ruin beaches and generally destroy our pristine coastline. The very premise of having an oil cleanup is a contradiction in terms.
Crews may contain and collect some of the spill, but calling it a "cleanup" is misleading and false comfort. Balls of oily tar are still being found in Alaska 26 years after the Exxon-Valdez disaster. And generations of sea birds and sea life suffer from the aftereffects of spills.
One pundit said public opinion will now pivot against proposed pipelines such as Kinder Morgan's which - dare we forget - transfers oil to ships in Burrard Inlet. In fact those plans call for huge increases in tanker traffic through B.C. waters. If one was shaken at all after the rather minor spill last week, just think about what one major spill in Burrard Inlet or on the coast would look like.
Having a "world-class" cleanup plan would pale in comparison to the damage caused by any future spill.
