9.30am AEDT Saturday 04 January 2014
Aurora Australis released from tasking in Antarctica
Xue Long’s attempt to manoeuvre through the ice early this morning was unsuccessful. Xue Long has confirmed to the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) it is beset by ice.
The Master of Xue Long has confirmed to AMSA that the ship is safe, it is not in distress and does not require assistance at this time. There is no immediate danger to personnel on board the Xue Long. The Xue Long has advised AMSA it has food supplies for several weeks. The Aurora Australis was placed on standby by AMSA’s Rescue Coordination Centre Australia (RCC Australia) last night to remain in open water in the area as a precautionary measure.
The Masters of both Akademik Shokalskiy and Xue Long agree that further assistance from Aurora Australis is no longer required and they will be able to provide mutual support to each other. The Aurora Australis has been released from search and rescue tasking by RCC Australia early this morning and continues to make its passage to the Casey base to complete a resupply. It will then continue to Hobart. RCC Australia will maintain regular contact with the Xue Long and Akademik Shokalskiy.
One fervently hopes that neither ship will be holed by the ice and require evacuation of crew…
@GktbbMhor: Let’s hope so.
I haven’t read any estimates of the cost of this rescue.
The warmists continue to endanger us all by their propaganda lies. I hope that at some point they are dismissed from their tax payer funded positions. That is what burns me the most….they are funded by taxpayers. They take our money at the point of the gun of government to follow their own fevered dreams, never once held to account for their idiocy.
If they can’t get out then the Polar Star is in Sydney, though by the time it gets to them the Southern hemisphere summer may have melted the sea ice.
What burns me is that they keep entrapping innocent bystanders who are required by international law and/or human compassion to pull their nuts out of the fire.
One would assume Richard Branson and the Figueres guy at the C.A.R.B.O.N. War Room would have already donned their Ironman exoskeletons and come to the rescue. (yeah iron. Recycled iron.)
At least they’ll have some extra manpower to carry stuff to Casey base. I hope they use it.
That puts those climate activists/true believers in their place … riding along as excess baggage while the ship they’re on continues with its regular, more important, resupply tasking.
Meanwhile, two vessels remain stuck in the ice as a result of the stupid conduct of those airheads.
I would be interested to know how many times the Xue Long has been stuck in ice in previous years. This was not of their making.
A report earlier in the icing in of the Akademik Shokalskiy said a hull breach 1.8m above the water line had been repaired. This ship is not an ice breaker. And, the pictures of ship showed the hull quite a bit out of the water, considerably above the water line listing ever so slightly to port. Stay tuned for further action.
Well, I give it 3 weeks and we will know what will happen. I am sure the Xue Long will get out but the S.A. ….
I hope the pseudo-scientists will get to stay a little while at Casey so the real scientists there can have a chance to express their feelings on this issue.
I’m glad contact with the two trapped ships will remain. I hope you will carry this story until we know all are safe. The crews, I care for – the rest, frankly not. Some fools need hard lessons. They may have escaped mother nature this time, but at least the scientific community (the genuine one, that is), is angry enough about this to drum some home truths into these knuckleheads.
A few wake-up calls are on the way and, oh, I sure hope we get to hear about all the shouting – this might be the first time these watermelons are not surrounded by their Cause-adoring fans. Could be some fun ahead.
There might come a moment when the Chinese have to help the Russians again. The Chinese are stuck, but their boat as an icebreaker is much stronger. The Russians, however, might have a bigger problem. However you see it, it will cost the Chinese heaps amount of money, every day is worth money. Don’t forget it. I hope they will do all the best they can to get their money back, not so much from the Russians, but from those Al Gore Warmers.
Chinese gaining some well needed Public Relations points. Stepping up as a world power should.
The cost figure being bandied about in Australian newspapers today is $400K – for the Oz taxpayer to cover apparently…
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/hit-for-ice-rescue-revealed/story-fn59nm2j-1226794662899#
How soon will the mantra flip to “Climate Change, not by fire but by ice”?
$400,000 hit for ice rescue revealed.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/hit-for-ice-rescue-revealed/story-fn59nm2j-1226794662899#
TAXPAYERS will foot a $400,000 bill for the rescue of a group of climate scientists, tourists and journalists from a stranded Russian research vessel – an operation that has blown the contingency budget of Australia’s Antarctic program and disrupted its scientific work. The Antarctic Division in Hobart said it was revising plans and considering airlifting urgently needed scientific equipment that could not be unloaded from Aurora Australis before the ship was diverted from the Casey base to rescue the novice ice explorers just before Christmas.
Dr. Turney, famed inventor of the “Turney Effect”, combining the Midas Touch with the Gore Effect. Everything that guy touches becomes mired in pack ice.
Turney and his Billy Butlin pseudo-scientists should have their collective heads hung low in utter shame.
He organised this farce to cherry-pick evidence to support a pre-decided “global warming” meme, with even two of the most biased AGW media outfits embedded in the pack, the BBC and the Guardian. The hubris is breathtaking.
These zealots trash science, they trash their parent institutions, they endanger the lives of others and they parasitise the taxpayers of Australia with the costs of the huge disruptions their idiotic disregard has caused.
Presently they’re munching their way towards Casey Base, still on everyone else’s tab.
The crew would regard them as a huge burden, and for someone (above) to suggest these incompetent galahs could “help” with unloading etc would be inviting continuing disaster.
Ok…almost every article I can find says the $1.5 million dollar trip (pre disaster that is) was “privately funded”. We know that Turney and Mortimer charted the ship and collected $$ from the paying “tourist” passengers..which makes up roughly half a million. We also know that they couldn’t even afford to purchase another $8,000 Argo for the trip because the website/fund didn’t earn enough. So where did the other MILLION come from? The BBC? The Guardian? Some University? I’m digging…but I can’t find anything….
Someone out there should be VERY unhappy.
I wonder what sort of a reception the “climate scientists” have had from the Aurora Australis crew? Probably about as warm and sympathetic as their reception is likely to be back at Casey Station, where Prof. Chris Thingo will find himself fronting hard-headed top level scientists whose serious research has been badly mucked up by these Toyland game players.
And that petulant young Guardian reporter is unlikely to get his milkshake in the station mess. (Sorry, the milk’s off.)
James Pickett (@fjpickett) says:
At least they’ll have some extra manpower to carry stuff to Casey base. I hope they use it.
Or NOT. They’d probably loose half the equipment trying to play “science” on the ice.
On their last outing they tried to get 3 Argos 50m to the shore and lost one of them. By the time they’d finish taking “selfies” in front of penguin colonies they’d managed to get the whole ship and crew into their present predicament.
No, I suggest the best thing would be to shackle them to the bar and give them enough G&Ts to keep them unconscious until they get back to Hobart.
Wow Mike-
“has blown the contingency budget of Australia’s Antarctic program and disrupted its scientific work.”
Not only a ruined trip, but a ruining of much more science too. How sad. 🙁
I would like to see the Casey base scientists appropriately ‘thank’ the entire bleating/tweeting batch of bilge baboons from the ‘Spirit of Mawson expedition’, for needlessly delaying the Casey base resupply and screwing up the research schedules of many serious scientists. A ‘Running of the Gauntlet’ between rows of irate technicians, research assistants, and scientists would be a good start…
Until it hasn’t.