Oil spill only adds to the filth

This would be really alarming news but for the fact that Rayong’s beaches are already so polluted that an oil spill will hardly be noticed. Mae Ramphung is the dumping ground for mountains of plastic bags, polystyrene, bottles, tins, cans, and detritus jettisoned by ships. I sometimes see the garbage trucks on the beach road, and would readily believe that they were making deliveries rather than collections.

Adding to this stinking mess, for the past three weeks the tides have been carrying in a brownish-green frothy slime that dries on the beach, leaving an odorous brown carpet. I do not know its origins or what it is, but suspect it is sewage effluent.

Your report quotes Puchong Sarittichaikul, director of a local marine-resources preservation centre, as saying that, with winds coming towards Rayong, he was “concerned the slick could reach the beaches”.

Why are the officials up in arms about an oil spill when for years they have blindly ignored the longer-term problem? Is it because this time they can point the finger at a corporate offender rather than their own mismanagement of Rayong’s coastal resources?

David Brown

Rayong