The Rena wreakage on the Astrolabe reef. Photo / Darryl Torckler
The Rena wreakage on the Astrolabe reef. Photo / Darryl Torckler
The MV Rena caused our worst maritime environmental disaster when it ploughed into the Bay of Plenty's Astrolabe Reef. Nearly four years later, a round of hearings - starting today - will determine whether it stays there.
Ask your average Tauranga local about the Rena and you'll find they haven't thought about that not-too-distant hunk of steel in a long time.
"Out of sight, out of mind" is what the city's mayor, Stuart Crosby, reckons has shifted the public's consciousness away from the container ship and the oily havoc its grounding wreaked in the stormy days of October 2011.
But every now and then, the city is given a small reminder of the environmental catastrophe that befell it.
On Wednesday, authorities were alerted to thousands of plastic beads from the ship that washed up on the white sands of Papamoa Beach.
While the issue has long fallen below the surface, just like the wreck on Astrolabe Reef - or Otaiti as tangata whenua know it - the debate and division that has been continuing behind closed doors will be hauled into the open again today.
Photo / Darryl Torckler
Over 24 days, an expert panel of commissioners chaired by retired Environment Court judge Gordon Whitling will hear arguments and evidence for and against a resource consent application by the ship's owners to abandon the wreck on the reef and authorise any further discharges of contaminants from it.
More than 150 submissions, from people and groups ranging from iwi to councils and fishing clubs, have been lodged on the application, which includes three volumes of evidence and technical reports each numbering hundreds of pages.
All of it will come down to a handful of questions.
• Will the ship owners be allowed to leave the wreck behind?
• How much of their mess will they have to clean up first?
• What will be the ongoing effects on the reef's environment?
A report prepared independently for the commissioners by the Bay of Plenty Regional Council concludes that, based on material provided by the ship owners and the council, the proposal could be approved.
The 61-page report's authors backed the owners' view that prising the whole of the wreck from the Astrolabe Reef, and clearing the mess of debris surrounding it, would further damage the reef and pose health and safety risks to salvors who had already put themselves in danger whittling the Rena's rusted bow down below the water line.
But some iwi groups and many other submitters are firmly opposed to leaving any trace of metal at the site.
"It is our belief that Otaiti is the leaping place of our spirits, a pataka for our whanau, and a sacred site of our esteemed cultural practices," wrote Kereama Akuhata in his submission on behalf of hapu Te Patuwai.
The hapu's home, Motiti Island, is 7km from the wreck site. Its rocky coast was blackened by some of the 350 tonnes of Marmite-like heavy fuel oil that washed ashore in the worst days of disaster, and littered by remnants of the hundreds of shipping containers cast into the ocean.
Donna Poka of Tauranga-based Ngai Te Rangi said complete removal was essential to the iwi's obligations as kaitiakitanga and tino rangatiratanga.
"This precept is strongly supported by the development of international law, and an additional overriding obligation to restore the biodiversity, the life force, the mauri of Otaiti."
Marine scientist Dr Roger Grace acknowledged the reef's cultural significance and said having the wreckage completely gone was the "only satisfactory future situation".
On the stern of the Rena at 30m. Photo / Darryl Torckler
But a salvage expert commissioned by the regional council pointed out the perils of attempting this, saying the aft section of the wreck, today barely recognisable and taken over by marine life, had fallen deeper down the reef and had become more difficult to remove.
Mr Crosby told the Herald that while it would be ideal if the Rena vanished, that wish had to be reconciled with reality.
"What's happened over the years is the majority of the ship has slipped further down the reef to depths of 40m to 60m, and that is definitely in the high danger level for recovery."
The council report did recommend the owners maintain the debris field surrounding the site as it was now, and be required to recover any debris swept outside a "baseline" zone during storms.
And it rejected the owners' position that a multi-million dollar bond wasn't needed to ensure the proposed consent conditions were followed.
There were also concerns about the environment around the wreck site, and particular worries about one contaminant, copper clove.
Twenty tonnes of the ecotoxic copper clove was thought to be still trapped inside a container in a collapsed hold 50m under the water. Some escaped into the reef ecosystem after Cyclone Pam in March.
Another contaminant, TBT, found in the antifouling paint on the Rena's hull, had been found in high concentrations around the reef, but scientists believed it posed a low risk and would vanish as the paint wore away.
The council officers' report asked that the copper clove be removed, unless it was impossible, and that TBT levels be monitored.
Possible pollution from "multiple stressors" - contaminants that even at low levels, could pose a combined threat to marine life - also warranted monitoring.
Back on shore, apart from the occasional appearance of plastic beads, there was little to suggest that not too long before, the tide had been turned oil-black and thousands of birds, among them little blue penguins and endangered dotterels, had died amid the tarry muck.
The final community newsletter on recovery efforts, published last week, reported there had been no traces of oil residue in beach sand over the past 12 months, and dotterel and penguin numbers were stable or increasing.
An earlier report by Waikato University marine scientist Professor Chris Battershill - whose emergency stocktake of the reef environment between the grounding and the spill later proved invaluable for recovery efforts - concluded "initial concerns ... that oil would have a long-lasting impact on beaches, reefs and fisheries ... can for the most part be put to rest".
Mr Crosby credited much of this to the army of volunteers and clean-up gangs - and the New Zealand Army - which worked quickly to clear more than 1000 tonnes of oily waste from beaches that were soon reopened.
"It was a phenomenal recovery, really, it exceeded our expectations," he said.
"I still maintain, however, that it could have been a lot worse - if most of the oil hadn't been removed by the original salvors, we would have had a long-term environmental issue on our hands."
Four years on, he believed it was essential that authorities and the shipping industry learn from an incident that cost the lives of at least 2400 birds and an estimated $1.2 million each day in local business losses over what was a ruined summer.
To the people of Motiti Island, nearby Astrolabe Reef or Otaiti is more than just a taonga anchored to their identity.
Umuhuri Matehaere says Otaiti is a key food source. Photo / Alan Gibson
"It's what we call our cupboard, our kapata - it's where our food comes from," said Umuhuri Matehaere, of the Motiti Rohe Moana Trust.
"As far as Motiti is concerned, it's essential."
Hit by washed-up oil and debris, the tiny island, one half avocado orchards, fared badly in the darkest days of the Rena disaster, and locals aren't convinced it has fully recovered to its pre-spill state.
"We can argue that, but we're not going to achieve anything by going in that direction," said Mr Matehaere, whose submission on behalf of the trust calls for the wreck to be removed, citing sections of the Resource Management Act and the Treaty of Waitangi.
He suspects that opposing the ship's owners' application on the basis of the reef's mauri, or spiritual life force, could be ineffective because that couldn't be scientifically measured.
If the application does get the go-ahead, which he suspects it would, the trust would consider the Environment Court as a next step.
However, unlike many submissions, the trust could be open to the reef being restored and preserved with the wreck still in place.
"For the trust, the biggest issue is trying to get the area around Otaiti, including Motiti Island, set aside as a marine protected area."
Leave it on the reef diving club
Any notion of the Rena wreck being a barren underwater wasteland free of marine life is "absolute rubbish", says Steve Fox, president of the Mt Maunganui Underwater Club.
Steve Fox says the wreck is best suited to advanced divers. Photo / Alan Gibson
As someone who frequently dived the reef before the Rena struck it, dived it just after the grounding, and dived it recently, Mr Fox has witnessed it morph into what is now a haven for fishlife.
"Wrecks tend to transform quite quickly if you let nature do its thing, and there are now parts of it where you are hard-pressed to know whether it's steel or rock, just because it's been colonised so much.
"At some points, you virtually have to push the fish away to be able to see the wreck."
On behalf of the club's 600 members, Mr Fox has submitted that debris around the site be cleared up and the Rena's hull remain on the reef.
While he understands that some contaminants might be discharged over time, he believes leaving the remains wwill enhance sea life and prevent more damage to the reef from further salvage operations.
That view is echoed by several other diving groups which have lodged submissions.
However, given the perilous position of the wreck, deep below the sea surface, Mr Fox considers the site an "advanced dive".
"There will be wreck-diving nuts who will just go crazy over it, but as a big visitor attraction to the Bay as a dive site, personally I can't see truck-loads of boats going out there."
Grounded on the reef
2.14am, October 5, 2011:
The Liberian-flagged MV Rena, with 1368 containers on board, crashes into the Astrolabe Reef. A storm a week later spills container debris and 350 tonnes of heavy fuel oil into the ocean.
January 2012:
More containers and debris are sent overboard as a violent storm breaks the Rena in half and it begins sinking.
Rena captain Mauro Balomaga and navigator Leonil Relon are jailed for seven months for offences including altering the ship's documents.
October 2012:
Rena owners Daina Shipping are fined $300,000 in the Tauranga District Court for discharging harmful substances.
December 2013:
Failings in Maritime New Zealand's initial response to the grounding are highlighted in an internal audit. A scientific report states minimal lasting effect on the environment.
"We are of the opinion the proposal does have wider adverse impacts on tourism."
Paul Bowker, then chairman of Tourism Bay of Plenty
"The owners need to accept full responsibility for the circumstances resulting in their ship colliding with the reef and totally remove the ship and contents."
Tauranga resident John Wade
"While the presence of the wreck on the reef is highly unfortunate, the effort involved in removing the final pieces far outweighs the benefits of doing so."
"Otaiti [Astrolabe Reef] is a taonga, pataka kai and wahi tapu of considerable significance to Ngati Awa."
Enid Ratahi-Pryor, Te Runanga O Ngati Awa
"Astrolabe Reef is an iconic and very important fishing location for our members. We want it cleaned up and cleared of MV Rena and debris."
Brian Rhodes, president of the Mt Maunganui Sport Fishing Club
"There has been a lot of media hype around people wishing to have the wreck removed from the site, but how many of these people are ever going to visit the site to see the beauty it will become under the waves?"
