TASMANIAN
LOG TRUCK ROAD KILL NIGHTMARE - THE MORNING AFTER
Some of Tasmania's shocking cruelty to
its native wildlife feeding at night is exposed. These
morning after pictures are taken on just one short
stretch of the Gordon River Road that is subject to
considerable nightly log truck traffic from places
like the Styx Valley. Many log trucks travel swiftly
throughout the night in order to keep up their busy
schedule together with concealing the vastness of
vandalism in the Tasmanian forests and their illegal
overloading (see illegal overloading
story below). The carcasses of this strategy are
left rotting in the next morning's daylight to tell
their ghastly tale. |
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WARNING
- FULL SIZE IMAGES MAY SHOCK
please zoom using your own discretion
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Below are 2 newspaper
roadkill stories from the Launceston Examiner.
As usual,
statistics gathered from Tasmanian Government
departments NEGLECT TO ACCOUNT FOR OR CONSIDER
the substantiial log trucks factor.
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Attitudes must
change to solve Tasmania's roadkill problem
By Fran Voss 17 April 2005
Grim end: A bennett's wallaby on the side of
the Bass Highway. Hundreds of thousands of animals
are killed on Tasmanian roads every year......
Tourists to the State are still expressing their
horror and disgust at the high number of mutilated
animal corpses they see. The Parks
and Wildlife Service estimates that more
than one million vertebrate animals are killed
each year on the State's roads and the number
is increasing. ....... A Roadkill
Collective set up in 2000 to look at ways of
reducing the toll is in recess.......
LAUNCESTON
EXAMINER... (17 April 2005) |
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TASMANIA, THE
ROADKILL STATE - Roadkill a tourist turn-off
LIBBY SUTHERLAND of AAP filed this national
story, Sunday, 16 March 2003
TASMANIA, THE ROADKILL STATE. COME TO TASMANIA
and see the wildlife - squashed flat and flyblown
in the middle of the road....... Anecdotal evidence
collected by State Parks
and Wildlife staff suggested about one
million mammals perished on Tasmanian roads
each year, she said........
LAUNCESTON
EXAMINER... (16 March 2003) |
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AS USUAL #2.... TASSIE STYLE |
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| FORESTS
VANDAL, ELECTION LIAR & WOODCHIP BARON ENCOURAGES
ILLEGAL LOG TRUCK OVERLOADING |
Gunns warned for overloading
By DANNY ROSE - 16 April 2005
GUNNS
Ltd has been criticised by a State Government
department for paying contractors who arrived at its
mills with overloaded trucks. Documents obtained by
the Greens under Freedom of Information laws show
Gunns
was warned to halt the practice in 2003, as it was
encouraging log truck drivers
to break the law. Senior Transport Department
bureaucrat David Spence wrote to the company on September
25, thanking it for sending letters to its contractors
warning of the need to comply with load limits. But
he added: "I must however express my disappointment
in the contradictory position your company has taken
by continuing to pay contractors for loads of up to
two tonnes over the legal limit.......
HOBART
MERCURY...
===============
Government Turns Blind Eye On Overloading
The Tasmanian Greens today released documents obtained
under freedom of information act from the Department
of Infrastructure Energy and Resources to Gunns
Ltd , which reveal that for the last two years
there have been serious concern about the practice
of overloading vehicles on overloading of log trucks
and that the Department is concerned that the company
may be inducing their cartage contractors to break
the law. ....... “It
is also apparent that despite polite requests from
the department that the company has blocked attempts
to have the department inspectors access Gunns’
weighbridges.” “The Department
has also expressed concern that the company is exacerbating
this serious problem by continuing to pay contractors
for loads up to two times over the legal limit, despite
receiving warning highlighting the legal breach this
entails.” ......... “The department knows
of the seriousness of the problem, that laws are being
breached and that potentially public safety is compromised,
despite all their attempts to rectify the situation
have been ineffectual.”........
TASMANIAN
GREENS...
===============
• LOG
/ WOODCHIP TRUCKS IN TASMANIA - TOURISTS TAKE NOTE
and TASMANIA, THE PREMIER LOG TRUCK STATE OF AUSTRALIA
(News Tasmania March 2005)
===============
• CHILLING
STORY - "He came up from behind very quickly
and sat less than 6 feet from me...." TASMANIAN
TIMES...
• RELATED
STORY - "Highway to hell" from 60 MINUTES...
• BACKGROUND
STORY - "Logging contractors losing livelihood"
HOBART MERCURY... |
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| AUSTRALIAN
GOVERNMENT INACTION ON FOREST VANDALISM CHALLENGED
IN COURT |
Court challenge against pulp mill
By Nick Clark - 15 April 2005
THE Wilderness Society has launched a Federal Court
challenge over the proposed pulp mill. The society
will appeal against the Federal Government's decision
not to examine the impact on Tasmanian forests of
the $1.3 billion Gunns
Limited mill. ....... It would seek an order
to direct Environment Minister Ian Campbell to redesignate
the pulp mill proposal as a controlled action and
to come under the Environment Protection Biodiversity
Act. Mr Law said independent studies had found there
was a 97 per cent chance the wedge tailed eagle would
be driven to extinction in north-east Tasmania if
forestry operations proceeded. "The proposed
pulp mill will consume more than 3 million tonnes
of wood each year yet the Government chose not to
assess the impacts of the mill on the forests,"
he said.......
HOBART
MERCURY...
===============
Pulp mill's approval challenged
By Andrew Darby - April 15, 2005
The Wilderness Society has challenged the environmental
approval process for the $1 billion Gunns
Tasmanian pulp mill. The society yesterday launched
action in the Federal Court to overturn the Howard
Government's approach to the mill, which will use
3 million tonnes of timber yearly from native forests
and plantations. The society claims the project fails
to count the costs to the island's native forests.
Under a jointly agreed draft federal-state environmental
assessment process released last week, Gunns
must give detailed information about the origins of
the mill's planned wood supply. But Wilderness Society
campaigner Sean Cadman said the process failed to
consider the mill's effect on the forests......
MELBOURNE
AGE...
===============
Wilderness Society to mount legal
challenge against Federal Government pulpmill decision
The Wilderness Society will mount a legal challenge
against a decision by the Federal Government not to
assess the impact of Gunns’
proposed pulpmill on Tasmania’s forests.......
WILDERNESS
SOCIETY... |
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| ARCHAEOLOGICAL
SURVEYING FOR ABORIGINAL & EUROPEAN HERITAGE...
TASSIE STYLE |
Dozer drivers judge archaeological
worth
12 April 2005
Australian Greens Senator Bob Brown has accused the
Tasmanian Government of leaving the archaeological
assessment of the historic Recherche
Bay site to the bulldozer drivers who will be
working in the area......
ABC
ONLINE...
History spotter role for loggers
By MICHELLE PAINE - 13 April 2005
THE State Government will rely on logging contractors
to notify authorities of "any new historic features"
they find at Recherche
Bay, says Greens senator Bob Brown. ...... Senator
Brown said: "Here we've got a heritage site of
state, national and international significance which
is going to be surveyed on the blade of the bulldozer."
He said the State Government expected workers to spot
and understand archaeological sites. "This flies
against international practice which Australia is
signed up to," Senator Brown said. "It's
an extraordinarily reckless attitude of the Tasmanian
Government and shows an enormous disdain towards Tasmania's
heritage, both Aboriginal and European heritage.".......
HOBART
MERCURY...
===============
Call to save historic site
By SIMON BEVILACQUA - 17 April 2005
RECHERCHE Bay is one of Australia's
most significant sites, says the man known
as the father of Australian archeology. Prof John
Mulvaney says the picturesque bay on Tasmania's southern
tip should be preserved as a living monument to some
of the most important moments in history. Prof Mulvaney,
79, has been studying Australia's pre-European and
early European history for half a century.....
SUNDAY
TASMANIAN...
March for history
By MICHELLE PAINE - 18 April 2005
ABOUT 1000 people marched to save Recherche
Bay yesterday ....... Logging of the site would
be marked forever as vandalism, said John Mulvaney,
considered the father of Australian archeology. .......
Wilderness Society co-ordinator Geoff Law said people
were "again forced to confront the contradiction
between the way Tasmania presents itself to the world
and the grim reality on the ground"......
HOBART
MERCURY...
===============
• Threat
from Damage & Destruction, NATIONAL TRUST...
(PDF)
• ABC
CATALYST on Recherche Bay... |
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| IT'S NOT EVERYWHERE
YOU CAN GET HOLIDAY PHOTOS LIKE THESE |
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Dean from South Australia has recently
returned home from holidaying in Tasmania in March
2005. He visited many places while touring Tasmania
including Mt. Bertha, Bronte, Derwent Bridge and
the Tarkine. He has kindly sent some interesting
holiday snaps to News Tasmania for all to share.
TO THE TOURING TASMANIA SLIDE SHOW |
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Gunns anti-Greens case 'muddled'
By Peter Gregory, Chief Court Reporter - April 9, 2005
Tasmanian timber company Gunns
had issued an embarrassing, confused and muddled claim in
its $6.36 million damages action against individuals and
environment groups, a Supreme Court judge heard today. Mark
Dreyfus, QC, for six of the defendants, foreshadowed applications
to strike out parts of Gunns'
216-page statement of claim lodged in December. Barristers
representing other defendants said they planned similar
action. Mr Dreyfus said further details would be sought
about the Gunns
claim, which alleged the company had been subjected to a
campaign to injure it and unlawfully interfere with its
business. "The statement (of claim) is very long, confused,
muddled, deficient in details and parts of it should be
struck out," he said. ........ Justice Bongiorno made
orders dealing with the defence information requests, and
Gunns
responses. He said a three-day hearing of "strike-out"applications
was expected in late June.
FULL
REPORT AT THE MELBOURNE AGE... |
THIS IS WHAT
RUNS THE SHOW.... TASSIE STYLE, HELPING TO POLLUTE
YOUR PLANET.
FACT - MEMORY PROBLEMS & BELLIGERENCE ARE SYMPTOMS
OF ALCOHOL ABUSE / DEPENDENCE |
Rough Red
RICHARD GUILLIATT: FULL VERSION @ TASMANIAN
TIMES...
It took a Tragedy to turn Paul Lennon into a
state premier. But it will take a miracle to
turn him into a charming one. Richard Guilliatt
approaches (with care) the famously belligerent
Tasmanian leader. Paul Lennon looks like a brickie’s
labourer stuffed into an expensive business
suit: his barrel-shaped girth betrays a lifetime
of beer-drinking, his jowls spill over his shirt
collar, and his bristling ginger moustache and
thunderously red complexion make him look perpetually
on the brink of either rage or heart attack.
So it’s easy to imagine how startled Alistair
Graham was, back in 1989, when the future premier
of Tasmanian grabbed him by the shirt front
and shoved him up against an office wall during
a meeting in Hobart.......
.....It was shortly after this that Alistair
Graham, Peg Putt’s partner, had his close-up
encounter with Lennon during a meeting of the
Forests and Forest Industry Council in Hobart.
(For his part, Lennon says he cannot recall
the incident.)...... |
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If there’s one thing that really pushes Lennon’s
buttons, however, it’s the suggestion that there
is anything improper about the government’s relationship
with big companies like Gunns.
The Edmund Rouse scandal casts a large shadow in Tasmania,
because Rouse was the chairman of Gunns
at the time he offered his $110,000 bribe to destroy
the Labor/Green accord. Evidence in the subsequent
Royal Commission showed that his main motivation was
protecting his $6 million timber investments. Bizarrely,
however, Lennon now seems to deny all of this.
Corruption where?
Aren’t Tasmanians, I ask, entitled to be wary,
given that there’s a history of corruption involving
politicians and the forestry issue?
“ Corruption where? Lennon shoots back.
Well, you had a Royal Commission here 10 or 12 years
ago….
“ What’s that got to do with forestry?”
he challenges.
Well, Edmund Rouse was the chairman of Gunns.
“ Chairman of Gunns?”
Lennon’s eyes narrow. “ Are you sure?”..........
(Reproduced from The Age Good Weekend Magazine
of 12 March 2005)
FULL VERSION @ TASMANIAN
TIMES...
=====================
• MORE
ABOUT THE CORRUPTION... . |
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| BUSINESS
AS USUAL #1.... TASSIE STYLE |
Havoc as Forestry fires out of
control
By LINDA SMITH - 02 April 2005
FOREST regeneration fires burning out of control caused
havoc in the Huon Valley yesterday, frightening residents
and tourists and threatening World Heritage areas.
........ Alarmed residents spent the day choking on
what they described as "a hideous amount of smoke"
and prepared for the worst as fires came within kilometres
of their properties. Angry tourists were turned away
from Tahune Airwalk as Arve Rd was closed......HOBART
MERCURY...
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Global Dimming
Reporter: BBC Horizon, Broadcast: 21/03/2005
Noticed less sunshine lately?
Scientists have discovered that the amount of
sunlight reaching the Earth's surface has been
falling over recent decades. If the climatologists
are right, their discovery holds the potential
for powerful disruption to life on our planet.
Already it may have contributed to many thousands
of deaths through drought and famine. Essentially,
the phenomenon called "global dimming"
may mean that even the direst predictions about
the rate of global warming have been seriously
underestimated....
ABC
FOUR CORNERS... |
Akin to Napalm... & "This is
the third night I have been forced out
of bed due to lack of breath from the
very heavy smoke inundation in my West
Calder home."...
TASMANIAN
TIMES COMMENTS |
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Wikipedia on Global
Dimming
>Relationship to Global
Warming<
WIKIPEDIA.... |
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Burn-off rekindles
ire
By DANNY ROSE 30 March 2005
MAJOR forestry burn-off created scenes likened
to an "erupting volcano" in the still
autumn skies over Hobart yesterday. Other callers
to The Mercury said the smoke looked like a
"mushroom cloud" enveloping the suburb
of Tolmans Hill......
HOBART
MERCURY... |
Forest burns
'gas' dispute
By SIMON BEVILACQUA - 03 April 2005
THOUSANDS of tonnes of carbon pumped into
the atmosphere by forestry burn-offs are
not listed on the Australian Greenhouse
Gas Inventory -- because they are considered
to be balanced by regrowth. More than
10,000ha of Tasmanian forest, most of
it wet eucalypt, are in the pipeline to
be burned this year. For every hectare
of wet eucalypt forest burnt about 200
tonnes of carbon is released, says Forestry
Tasmania research. ........ Most of
the carbon from burn-offs is in the form
of the infamous greenhouse gas, carbon
dioxide, which is driving global warming.
......... But calls since the 1990s for
carbon dioxide from burn-offs to be included
have so far been ignored......
SUNDAY
TASMANIAN... |
Alarm bells
over plantations
By SIMON BEVILACQUA - 03 April 2005
......In 1997-1998 Indonesian forest fires
spewed between 810 million and 2.57 billion
tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere.
This was equal to between 13 per cent
and 40 per cent of the mean annual global
carbon emissions from fossil fuels. Perhaps
it was the Indonesian experience that
led CSIRO scientists to ring alarm bells
in 1998 about the way forests were perceived
in Australia. Working for the Biosphere
Working Group of CSIRO's Climate Change
Research Program, Miko Kirschbaum said
production forests, considered "sinks"
in Australia, could actually be a source
of carbon dioxide pollution. Dr Kirschbaum
said the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory
failed to include direct carbon loss from
fire. "It creates the anomalous situation
where forests are calculated to be carbon
sinks whereas in reality they may be losing
carbon due to the combined losses from
fires and forest harvesting," he
said. As far back as 1997 the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change said man-made
fires should be included in national inventories.
Dr Kirschbaum criticised previous data
which showed forests were sinks when in
fact they were likely sources of pollution......
SUNDAY
TASMANIAN... |
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| JOURNALISM.....
TASSIE STYLE |
The Examiner runs ads as news
......Turning the pages reveals that an extraordinary
9 out of the ten articles in this ‘issues’
section are lifted virtually word for word from the
advertising supplement. ....... And Gunns
Limited is also the author of that article. The whole
thing was lifted from the Gunns’
website. ......... "The
Examiner’s article simply parrots Gunn's
own description of itself – not much journalism
in that. ...... Maybe Tasmanians are happy to have
their newspaper articles written by the government
and industry, but we think not.
ABC
MEDIA WATCH... |
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This Gunn says she's no chip off old block
By DANNY ROSE - 29 March 2005
A DIRECT descendant of the brothers who founded Gunns
Ltd has slammed the company, accusing it of using fear
tactics and exploiting Tasmania's forests. Sarah Gunn, great-granddaughter
of Thomas Gunn, has spoken out against the $1.5 billion
company which still bears her family name. ........ "My
support lies with the people being sued and it is to the
family's shame that it is happening."........
HOBART
MERCURY... |
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