Explorer sinks in Titanic disaster, users saved by Norwegian enterprise...
Saturday, 24. November 2007, 17:13:41
Really. MS Explorer has sunk out of view now, according to the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten.
Fortunately, all 154 users were rescued, making it to their lifeboats after the ship was struck by an iceberg, but before it vanished beneath the fairly chilly waters off the Antarctic where it was on a cruise. The survivors were later transferred to the MS Nord-Norge, apparently.
I hope they are luckier than the people who were picked up by another famous Norwegian rescue - when Captain Arne Rinnan went to thelp 400-odd people in a sinking boat, in his ship the MV Tampa. For his troubles, in an attempt to stop him doing the legal, sane and humane thing and landing the 300-odd refugees on Christmas Island, the former Australian government (in election mode) decided that it made sense to order the SAS to board his ship. Not being international talk like a pirate day, and with real guns, it was apparently hard to see any real humour, let alone humanity.
Those people, having fled countries that Australia was right then deciding to help destroy completely, were subsequently locked up in concentration camps hastily set up around the Pacific, some for a number of years, before being scattered again in a macho attempt to prove that a 60-year-old lawyer was still virile enough to be allowed to play soldiers with real lives (if with almost transparent dishonesty).
Luckily for them, the folks on MS Explorer are apparently the kind wealthy enough to cruise dangerous waters for the fun of it, and therefore deserving of all our sympathy and assistance. Even more fortunately, the government that instituted the appalling "Pacific solution" was finally, 6 years and 3 chances later, voted out of office today.
Watching my country from the other side of the world, I am more relaxed and comfortable about it than I have been for a decade or so. But there is work to do - I can only hope that the short-sighted and cruel approach to dealing with refugees will be amng the things rolled back with the shirtsleeves as Australians get on with cleaning up the country.
There is a lot of work to make Australia the fair and decent place it once was, but hopefully that is the direction it is now headed. Thank you, people of Australia, for finally making me relaxed and comfortable. And good luck to the folks on the MS Explorer. Not necessarily a name that would have filled me with confidence, but whatever the history I am glad that you are all safe...
Fortunately, all 154 users were rescued, making it to their lifeboats after the ship was struck by an iceberg, but before it vanished beneath the fairly chilly waters off the Antarctic where it was on a cruise. The survivors were later transferred to the MS Nord-Norge, apparently.
I hope they are luckier than the people who were picked up by another famous Norwegian rescue - when Captain Arne Rinnan went to thelp 400-odd people in a sinking boat, in his ship the MV Tampa. For his troubles, in an attempt to stop him doing the legal, sane and humane thing and landing the 300-odd refugees on Christmas Island, the former Australian government (in election mode) decided that it made sense to order the SAS to board his ship. Not being international talk like a pirate day, and with real guns, it was apparently hard to see any real humour, let alone humanity.
Those people, having fled countries that Australia was right then deciding to help destroy completely, were subsequently locked up in concentration camps hastily set up around the Pacific, some for a number of years, before being scattered again in a macho attempt to prove that a 60-year-old lawyer was still virile enough to be allowed to play soldiers with real lives (if with almost transparent dishonesty).
Luckily for them, the folks on MS Explorer are apparently the kind wealthy enough to cruise dangerous waters for the fun of it, and therefore deserving of all our sympathy and assistance. Even more fortunately, the government that instituted the appalling "Pacific solution" was finally, 6 years and 3 chances later, voted out of office today.
Watching my country from the other side of the world, I am more relaxed and comfortable about it than I have been for a decade or so. But there is work to do - I can only hope that the short-sighted and cruel approach to dealing with refugees will be amng the things rolled back with the shirtsleeves as Australians get on with cleaning up the country.
There is a lot of work to make Australia the fair and decent place it once was, but hopefully that is the direction it is now headed. Thank you, people of Australia, for finally making me relaxed and comfortable. And good luck to the folks on the MS Explorer. Not necessarily a name that would have filled me with confidence, but whatever the history I am glad that you are all safe...
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i can identify with the ill-starred cruise of the MS Explorer -- before the launch of Windows98, i received a "Start Button" keychain at a technical conference... not realizing what i was doing, i used the keychain to hold the keys to the apartment i had just let in joisey city... after moving the last bit of my possessions into the small apartment, carved out of what, a 150 years ago, when built, must have been a considerable old mansion, but which now was waiting for the wrecking ball to clear it away, i decided to clean off and get a clean start in my new apartment by taking a shower... whilst i was singing in the shower (probably "the pineapple rag") my then-girlfriend gave a shout from the kitchen, which was conveniently located next door to the bathroom... i called out to her to ascertain what the trouble was, and she shouted back that a large acrid cloud and a small burst of flame had emerged from the kitchen's ceiling's light fixture, as it -- and the rest of the electricity in the apartment -- was cut... i suggested she call the fire department, and by the time i got out of the shower and had slipped back into my grimy moving clothes, the fire department had arrived in the form of 4 fire trucks, from which a seemingly endless stream of firemen poured into the apartment building, i having taken as out-of-the-way a position as i could on the stone ledge of the front entrance... after checking the house (and being checked out in turn by several residents of my apartment and the adjoining area), a fireman told me that he had turned off the electricity, and that it would remain off until my landlord had a certified electrician check the wiring... i placed a call to my landlord about an hour later, and learnt that he had already been issued a verbal warning by the fire department about the safety of the building into which i had just moved... since the electrical fire had only errupted in my apartment, i was told that i'd have to find somewhere else to stay until the problem was diagnosed and fixed... a few hours later, i returned to my erstwhile apartment to collect the few essentials i'd need to get ready for work the next morning, but when i entered, i heard a strange sound eminating from the bathroom -- somewhere between the sizzle of bacon in a pan and the steady heavy drizzle of monsoon rains... curious, and needing a few items that were in the bathroom, i entered, only to find my face suddenly pressed into something silumtaneously soggy and granular, as i received a heavy blow to my forehead... confused, sneezing and a bit off-balance, i retreated from the bathroom and left the apartment... when i returned to where i was temporarily staying, there was a message awaiting me from my landlord, warning me not to enter the apartment, and, if i did, to definitely, under any circumstances, stay out of the bathroom, as the water pipes in the bathroom in the apartment directly above mine had been leaking, which not only caused the shortage and electricity outage, but which so soaked the wood and plaster, that the iron claw-foot bathtub in the upstairs apartment was slowly falling through the ceiling, and might give way at any time...
the moral of the story? he who boots his new apartment with win98 is just asking for a catastrophic system crash...
By oedipus, # 17. December 2007, 17:05:33