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Greenpeace Blog

Day 2 - Love for the pod

Posted by jamess — 22 September 2010 at 9:58pm - Comments

Following a heroic 24 hours by Anais and Victor in the tent suspended off the anchor chain, today we stepped it all up a notch by bringing in a purpose-built half-tonne survival pod.

I say ‘we’ but in fact I just sat on the safety boat watching in awe at the rigging magic going on at the hands of Anais, Victor, Nazareth and Timo.

Article tagged as: chevron, climate change, go beyond oil, oil, oil spill, pod

Video: attaching our survival pod to the Stena Carron

Posted by jossc — 22 September 2010 at 3:02pm - Comments

Nice video footage just in of today's action to attach a survival pod to the anchor chain of Chevron's drilling ship, the Stena Carron.

Now the pod is successfully attached it will make life a bit easier for the activists aboard, enabling them to stay in position far longer than the previous portaledge.

Greenpeace is in Shetland to stop dangerous deep water drilling in UK waters, which resulted in the Gulf oil disaster earlier in the year. Greenpeace campaigner Leila is on hand to tell you more...

Article tagged as: action, chevron, climate change, oil spill, shetland

Stick your message on our pod

Posted by jamie — 22 September 2010 at 1:31pm - Comments

Not all of us can scamper up an oil rig's anchor chain - but we can all come up with ideas, and we need yours asap.

As our occupation of Chevron's massive drill ship goes on, we want a banner slogan from you to explain what our politicians need to do about deep water drilling.

Article tagged as: chevron, climate change, energy, esperanza, go beyond oil, oil, stena don

Elephants and lemons: Lib Dems make Fox's bed of nails on Trident

Posted by simon clydesdale — 22 September 2010 at 11:31am - Comments

This morning the Lib Dem conference voted unanimously for a review of the decision to replace Trident, and finally managed to prod their ministers into making some noise on the issue. This is a huge step forward for the majority of Britons who aren't convinced of the need to spend £97 billion on cold war weapons whilst public services are being slashed. Simon Clydesdale, our man on the conference floor, explains the implications:

 

Shirley Williams was asked recently what it was like being in bed with the Conservatives. She cannily replied that it was actually a case of two beds. And this morning the Lib Dems took the opportunity to make their bed in a distinctly different style to their Tory coalition partners when they voted to adopt an emergency motion on replacing Trident.

Article tagged as: disarmament, liberal democrats, party conferences, peace, trident

Pod people latch on in phase two of drilling ship action

Posted by jamie — 22 September 2010 at 10:14am - Comments
Attaching our pod to the Stena Carron

We've stepped up our action in the waters off Shetland where - in addition to climbers Victor and Anais on the anchor chain of the Stena Carron – a custom-built survival pod has been brought into play. Two metres in diameter and weighing half a tonne, it's also been attached to the anchor chain of the Chevron-operated drilling ship which was due to leave for the Lagavulin oil field - but now isn't going anywhere.

Article tagged as: action, chevron, climate change, oil spill, shetland

Chevron: another company that needs to go beyond oil

Posted by jamie — 22 September 2010 at 9:45am - Comments

As you probably know by now, the ship our climbers are currently sitting on is the Stena Carron, a 228m drill ship operated by US oil giant Chevron. Texaco, its petrol station subsidiary, is perhaps the name you may be more familiar with, but here are a few facts about the company that you might not know.

Chevron's boss, John S Watson, is a director and member of the executive committee of the American Petroleum Institute (API). The API is a major lobby group funding research which seeks to undermine the scientific consensus on climate change.

Article tagged as: chevron, climate change, energy, go beyond oil, oil

Day 1 of our action to stop deepwater drilling in the UK

Posted by jamess — 21 September 2010 at 7:12pm - Comments

Slideshow of the latest images from the action

It’s been a hectic day - but a successful one.

We heard at our ship’s briefing this morning at 0800 that our friends were going to attempt to get on Chevron’s massive Stena Carron rig in the next couple of hours and stop it from moving.

Article tagged as: action, chevron, climate change, oil spill, shetland

Hanging out on the Stena Carron's anchor chain.

Posted by jossc — 21 September 2010 at 4:20pm - Comments

A short but sweet clip of Greenpeace climbers Anais (from Germany) and Victor (from Sweden) in their Portaledge on the anchor chain of the Chevron drilling ship, the Stena Carron, off the Shetland coast.

According to Victor the weather is fine, both he and Anais are "very happy", and they have enough food to stay for two weeks!

Whilst they remain in position, the giant ship cannot move. It was due to leave anchor to drill for oil in the deep waters of the Atlantic off Shetland's west coast.

Article tagged as: chevron, climate change, go beyond oil, shetland

What's it like hanging from an anchor chain?

Posted by jamie — 21 September 2010 at 3:53pm - Comments

Listen!

I just spoke to Victor, one of the climbers currently hanging on the anchor chain of the Stena Carron drilling ship. Operated by Chevron, it was due to head out to a deep water site off the Shetlands, but not any more.

Despite the wind and having to manoeuvre their portaledge tent into position, Victor sounds extremely chirpy and pleased to be there!

Article tagged as: audio, chevron, climate change, go beyond oil, oil, stena carron

Hughes tells party "we must fight on Trident"

Posted by Louise Edge — 21 September 2010 at 3:26pm - Comments

Deputy leader Simon Hughes opposes Trident replacement: "the case is winnable and we must not yield."

Monday and Tuesday at conference have been a bit of a rollercoaster for Team Trident.

Political conferences, stuffed as they are with politicians and media types, are always awash with rumours. And as we followed the speeches, the press coverage, the tweets and just plain old chatted to people we swayed between pessimism and optimism.

Article tagged as: liberal democrats, nuclear weapons, party conferences, trident

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