What the U.S. Military thinks about reefs...

[Anonymous]

https://www.denix.osd.mil/denix/Public/ ... coral.html

notice the following :wink:

Why is Coral Reef Conservation Important to the Military ?

Helps maintain natural landscapes for realistic military training, now and in the future.
Helps DoD protect water resources, endangered species and other important resources.
Contributes to national security by helping maintain the natural resources, especially fisheries, upon which this country’s strength depends.
Provides public relations benefit because people want good stewardship of their natural resources.
Enhances quality of life for military personnel.

This instruction, signed in 1996, lays out specific management tactics to achieve conservation goals

"Maintain or restore remaining native ecosystem types across their natural range of variation".
"Maintain or reestablish viable populations of all native species in areas of natural habitat, when practicable."
"Maintain evolutionary and ecological processes, such as disturbance regimes, hydrological processes, and nutrient cycles."
"Manage over sufficiently long time periods to allow for changing system dynamics."
"Plan to accommodate human use as necessary."

just a little fyi from a fellow reefer on #reefs, who pasted this link to the channel:wink:

(thanks for letting me post this)
:wink:

 

[Ralphyhp]

Vitz so why they still bombing the coral reefs of Vieques, Puerto Rico. Vieques is a island of Puerto Rico where the U.S Military use to practice on there reefs for many years. You can find U.S. misiles on the depth of the reefs, the marine live is all fuc..p on those impact zones, you cant imagine , now i do the same question, why is coral reef conservation important to the military? You now, i dont :wink: Ralphyhp

 

[Ralphyhp]

Take a look to the complete history and the effects of bombing the coral reefs of Vieques PR. http://www.edie.net/news/archive/4177.cfm or you can make your own question on, www.google.com.

 

[Anonymous]

The Navy has agreed to stop using Vieques for a bombing range. There is an exercise underway now that will be the last one at that site.

 

[Ralphyhp]

George Bush didnt sign any agreement of leaving Vieques, but he says they stop the bombing in march 3/03. But this post talk about how the U.S. military cares about the conservation of our coral reffs and i cant find a positive way they care about it. They can leave Vieques today but the damage are already done Minime. Ralphyhp

 

[Apophis924]

The damage is done, no use crying about it all we can do is try to correct it and prevent it from happnening again. But being a militray memeber i KNOW how serious the military takes the enviroment. Tust me. the simple act of dumping ONE quart of oil on the ground not even in the water is enough to get serious fines, commanders fired and yes the actuall indidvidual that dumped the oil a serious fine and his career down da drain. I personally spent hundreds of hours changing Halon fire ext for less efffienct and more costly dry chem and CO2 ones because of enviromental concerns.

 

[mzem]

I find it truely interesting that the US military is exempt from nearly every environmental law passed. Not to mention free from public liability. The Navy has a good environmental record purely because they are not required to report their incidents at sea. Have you ever wondered why there are not many spills reported from the military yet cargo ship spills of any size make front page news?????? Something to ponder anyway.

mzem

 

[Apophis924]

mzem could you tell me what regulations the Military is exempt from. Are you even active duty? I would love to know what regs i do not have to follow would save me and my squadrona LOT of time and $$. I know we have yearly inspections from the EPA , we also have internal ECAMP inspectiosn also done by the state. And we have to report ALL haz mat events. You know we cant even load up Haz mat on an aircraft unless we clear it with what ever state and country that plane has to fly over. Not to mention we are accountable to OSHA for the health and saftey of all our empyees civilan and military.

 

[mzem]

Active duty? No. Maritime prefessional in the public sector. Yes. I can tell you very specifically that 33 CFR specifically exempts public vessels. IE any military vessel on the water. 33 CFR deals specifically with the Oil Pollution Regulations. CFR is simply the Code of Federal Regulations. I have no doubt of the internal paperwork the military has to go through. The same for internal accountability. What I can say is that any incident that does occur will be dealt with internally also. The public will not be notified as the military is not required to report them. Nor can the miitary be held accountable to the public for any incident. That is not to say that safeguards are not in place within the military. I won't disagree with anyone on that topic. The public sector would be outraged if there were not internal checks. All I'm saying is the military would tred a little bit lighter if those same commanders could face the prison terms and civic liabilities as those in the public sector.

mzem

 

[Apophis924]

If you review the internal regs, you would know that when violations of EPA takes place, Not only is the squadron accountable and the commander But they actually tsake fines out of the offender's personal funds. And the military does not report to the public does not mean that they disregard the public safteyor concenrs. Yes there are times some polices are more laxed with miltary actions ex- Flying super soninc produces sonic booms that are proven to be detrtimental to the enviroment. But in the interest of timely movments and target engagement, not to mention defeinding a distant site, We do break the sound barrier. All things must be taken based on the situation. TO go by absolutes without considering the situation is futile. Go by the spirt of the law Not the letter of the law. When you break it down the military has a much better record for protecting natural resoruces than corporate ameirca.

 

[mountainbiker619]

Active duty Navy here. I have spent a total of 7 years at sea on both a Destroyer and an Aircraft Carrier. Never has any ship that I have been on had a oil spill, or anything to that nature while at sea. Nor to my recall has any ship within the battle group I was with had a oil spill either. I garuntee you that personnal boats do more damage to the ocean than all the US Navy vessels combined.

 

[Apophis924]

^5 on that mountain. Folks dont know when you spill fuel or most haz mat. besides it being bad for the enviroment it aint too good for your career or for that matter the units readiness if they depend on that substance in combat. Plus the down time cleaning up, explaining what happmned and demonstrating that it will not occur again.

 

[Anonymous]

i guess some of you didn't get my (sarcastic) reasons for highlighting what i did :wink:

 

[Anonymous]

Where you stationed, mountain? North Island? I get great shots of the bay (for the most part) using the webcam on the SD Union-Trib site.

My father, ex-husband, dead brother-in-law, and ex-boyfriend all served Navy. The last three all served aboard the Ranger (now decommissioned I believe). Something about the thought of a man out to sea for months at a time that I find absolutely titillating. 8)

 

[Lurshy]

I heard after they stop bombing in P.R. they are going to open a new bombing range near Bagdad. :roll:

Boy that was in bad taste. Best wishes to those in the military!

 

[Anonymous]

But it was still a teeny bit funny. (Most of my family is Puerto Rican and - ACK! - republican!)