FOLLOWUP: Shell drill rig still in Port Angeles, awaiting trip here

(Saturday photo by Chuck Jacobs)
Six days after arriving in Port Angeles, the drilling platform Polar Pioneer is still there, being prepared for its tow to West Seattle’s Terminal 5. The Peninsula Daily News reports that it’s an economic boom to PA – both from the workers that are getting it ready for the trip, and from tourists who have come to gawk at it. It’s expected to start heading this way by early May. When it gets here – it’ll be a gawk magnet even here in the big city. Remember the SBX floating radar platform that was here in 2011?

(WSB photo, August 2011)
Polar Pioneer is 25 percent taller – 355 feet, compared to the SBX’s 280. Pending the Polar Pioneer’s arrival, the icebreaker Aiviq remains the lone Shell-related vessel at Terminal 5; the other drilling vessel, Noble Discoverer (derrick height 170′), is still crossing the North Pacific, headed this way.

Meantime, Arctic drilling opponents are still preparing for rallies here, even before the Shell drill rigs get here. The Shell No” coalition sent this photo of banner-waving on the foot/bike bridge over the Fauntleroy approach to the bridge this past Monday evening:

They’re planning to rally at Myrtle Edwards Park at 2 pm this Sunday in addition to already-announced mid-May actions – that’s the rally announced during the “encouragement march” in West Seattle earlier this month. A kayak flotilla is also planned for May 16th, with ongoing training at Alki Kayak Tours in West Seattle – a session at 5 pm tonight is for would-be trainers.

And the Port of Seattle already has a webpage linking to its reminders and background about the T-5 situation, pending the start of protests and arrival of more vessels, including a link to the Coast Guard’s announcement of “safety zones” and a “voluntary free-speech zone.”

32 Replies to "FOLLOWUP: Shell drill rig still in Port Angeles, awaiting trip here"

  • Anonymous Coward April 23, 2015 (5:38 am)

    Isn’t seeking support for your campaign against the production of fossil fuels from an overpass a bit like seeking support for your campaign against private gun ownership outside the entrance to an NRA convention?

  • Smitty April 23, 2015 (6:26 am)

    I am assuming they time it so they arrive around 4:00 in the morning. Hippies be sleepy.

  • Correction? April 23, 2015 (7:51 am)

    Predawn?
    “The rig arrived in the harbor at 7 a.m., the Peninsula Daily News reported.”
    The sun rose at 5:17 about two hours earlier.

  • Lance April 23, 2015 (7:53 am)

    Did the protesters ride their bikes to the protest? Really fanatics are all almost equally ridiculous. Why don’ t they protest port corruption instead of the port trying to attract paying customers.

  • Brian April 23, 2015 (8:41 am)

    @Anonymous Cowards: Thanks for your myopia and inability to look at the big picture! We all appreciate it!

  • El Hefe April 23, 2015 (8:49 am)

    Isn’t it funny how anybody who questions anything about fossil fuels is a “hippie”. Love the grade school mentality the main stream media has dumbed down the general public with. Horray for being another sheep in the flock!!

  • Smitty April 23, 2015 (9:05 am)

    “Isn’t it funny how anybody who questions anything about fossil fuels is a “hippie”.”

    Science denier, Right wing whacko, Chickenhawk and I all had a good laugh at your post.

  • Azimuth April 23, 2015 (9:12 am)

    Just for fun they should see if it will fit through the lower bridge and under the upper bridge at rush hour!

  • G April 23, 2015 (9:31 am)

    Actually, it is national media who have passively swallowed the climate narrative of fire and brimstone from the climate fundamentalists and disseminated it to an equally docile public.

  • Neighbor April 23, 2015 (9:35 am)

    Tone is difficult to determine in writing. To call people that are against artic drilling or protestors “hippies” sounds pejorative. I don’t think you have to be cowed into silence because you haven’t totally abstained from petroleum products. The artic is a pristine environment many of us want to preserve. We have all seen the devastating effects of the deep water horizon on the gulf and the Exxon Valdez. The short term effects of jobs may easily be negated by the long term effects of a disaster. People who had good paying jobs from the ocean did get jobs from the cleanup but we’re then exposed to toxic chemicals. Not to mention that large corporations put their money into fighting and defending their malicious ways instead of putting it into the community.

  • ChefJoe April 23, 2015 (9:46 am)

    Azimuth, 140 ft clearance on the high bridge vs 355 feet would be pretty obvious to most that you’re just suggesting to destroy both public and private property.

    • WSB April 23, 2015 (10:08 am)

      Chef, thanks for that number, that’s another description we’ll keep in mind – ‘twice as high as the bridge’ …

  • quiz April 23, 2015 (10:17 am)

    Sad truth is, drilling/extracting won’t stop until resources are depleted around the earth. There’s simply too much money involved, and it’s a pay to play world we live in.

    Don’t like the laws? Pay off politicians to change them. Don’t have access to explore an area? Pay to get in.

    I hate to sound like a cynic, but even if we cut back in the US by utilizing new tech., the developing world won’t.

    I don’t like it, it’s just facts.

  • Jim April 23, 2015 (10:41 am)

    The “grade school mentality” seems to me to be evident in those who think that the oil companies are the problem. The oil companies exist and continue to explore for more oil because WE demand it. They reflect the average person on the street whose entire lifestyle depends upon oil one way or another.

    Go protest that guy. He’s everywhere.

  • joezaloom April 23, 2015 (12:46 pm)

    @Anonymous Coward: That was a good one. Thanks for the laugh. To everybody else: I didn’t see this as a political statement so much as a wry observation. Get over yourselves and enjoy a joke every now and again.

  • Kate April 23, 2015 (1:24 pm)

    This thing is huge. We have a vacation house 12 miles west of Port Angeles and we could see it quite clearly last weekend.

  • me April 23, 2015 (1:30 pm)

    I do not support Shell.

  • Watertowerjoey April 23, 2015 (2:10 pm)

    Will it be higher than the cranes it will be parked next too? can’t wait to see it.

  • Azimuth April 23, 2015 (2:51 pm)

    ChefJoe, I give a response courtesy of Zoolander:

    Meekus: Uh, earth to Brint, I was making a joke.

    Brint: Uh, Earth to Meekus, duh, okay I knew that!

    Meekus: Uh earth to Brint, I’m not so sure you did cuz you were all ‘well I’m sure he’s heard of drilling platforms like you *didn’t* know it was a joke!

    Brint: I knew it was a joke Meekus, I just didn’t get it right away!

    Meekus: Earth to Brint…

    Derek Zoolander: Would you guys stop it already?

    Thanks – Azimuth

  • ChefJoe April 23, 2015 (5:10 pm)

    Yes, Super Post-Panamax cranes are 267′ tall at the apex point, according to the port tour.

    http://www.portseattle.org/Cargo/SeaCargo/Documents/Terminal_Tour_V3_SM.pdf

  • GGores April 23, 2015 (5:22 pm)

    Hmmmm……. A boon for Pa huh? Could be a boon for unemployed folks in a Seattle. Unless you NEVER drive a vehicle, use a gas mower on your lawn, have plastic items in your house, your just a hypocrite . Petroleum products are in items you use everyday. Not saying drilling in the Arctic is a good thing. But until we all stop using petroleum base products, this will happen.

  • CJ April 23, 2015 (8:38 pm)

    The point of contention is not the what but the where. Arctic drilling should concern us all as habitat will be destroyed and there is great potential for an environmental disaster that would destroy what we all depend on. Should we also not concern ourselves with the oil companies efforts to drill in national parks because we use oil? They will(and have) drill(ed) without regard to anyone or anything if it means money. Citizens are the ones in a position to stop this as we have no special interest ties, no politics to juggle, and generally consider the greater good. Citizens must speak out. Instead of attacking people’s concerns, why not consider there may be something behind the concerns and do a little research? Otherwise you just sound like agents for big oil. Just because we use fossil fuels doesn’t mean we want or should approve the entire earth being torn up to pursue them. As for the argument that it is the individuals fault for oil companies drilling, their PR tactics worked well on you. Oil companies spend millions to make sure we stay dependent on oil. Anything that could replace fossil fuels they fight. It’s why electric cars are a relative few. Sure, if we all stop consuming fossil fuels in its many forms, fossil fuels would no longer hold value, and the drilling would stop. But oil companies are doing everything in their power to make sure that doesn’t happen.

  • G April 23, 2015 (10:53 pm)

    Modern society and a lot of great things about it – including longer life spans for ALL of us – has been made possible to great extent by oil. Our society practically floats on oil. The ambulance that takes you to the hospital? The rubber gloves and catheter and medical equipment? Your pill bottle and pill box? Oil. And on and on and on.

  • Artemis G Gordon Liddy April 24, 2015 (2:05 am)

    People are unshakable in their belief systems. I am no different. I think that global warming promoters are hucksters, snake oil salesmen, joyless buzzkills. These Elmer Gantrys of the modern age manipulate the weak minded to further their cause, which is to increase the size of their bank account, profiting from lecture circuit and generous government contracts all in the name of decreasing the non existant threat of man made global warming. I came across the four young people that climbed the Polar Pioneer a few days ago. Simpletons, inflated in self importance. Fools. Their faith unwavering, their zeal was burning. They accomplished nothing, just a footnote of a story on MSNBC. Shell will Still drill in the uninhabital Arctic wasteland, they will profit from it and I will use the byproduct of what they produce and wiil be thankful for the smart people who can engineer such industrial marvels and I wiil be thankful for the tough people who are willing to brave the elements in order to make my life easier so that I can enjoy gas to power a Greenpeace vessel, oil to lubricate the engines of the vehicle which transports me to the Earth Day ceremony, roads made from asphalt which link me to the protest from my apartment heated by fossil fuel, plastics which form my waterproof jacket so I can stay warm while I cling to the side of the Polar Pioneer like a barnicle, tires that rotate on the surface of the asphalt road which take me to the Earth Day celebration, Nylon rope with which to scale industrial monoliths, shoes with rubber soles which grip the cold steel on the oil platform so I don’t slip into the ocean and drown, zodiac inflatable protest boats that carry me to the Polar Pioneer, Vinyl sheets with which to construct protest banners against the producers of the products which create the vinyl sheets…

    Blinded manipulated fools.

  • ws April 24, 2015 (7:01 am)

    I am glad somebody is trying to stand up to big oil. I watched an intriguing documentary last night called “the great invisible” It was about oil. Good doc on netflix. If we just added a small chip to every car we can use methanol or biofuel. It’s way cleaner then gasolive and we can produce unlimited amounts here in the states.

  • Jim Wilke April 24, 2015 (9:02 am)

    I’ve lived in Alaska all my life, travel frequently to the area where drilling will take place. You folks have no idea of the crushing poverty that exists there, no conception of the harsh conditions. You’ll note that the Native people that live in the area support Shell’s plans and have partnered with them. This project will provide jobs and support for the thousands of Alaskans who live there while maybe, just maybe, there will enough oil left to make some plastic kayaks.

  • Jim Wilke April 24, 2015 (9:56 am)

    “We need more alternative energy…”

    http://www.richmond.com/business/local/article_babe7669-ac56-5fd3-9622-891563adbc74.html

  • Dawn April 24, 2015 (12:26 pm)

    @Artemis G Gordon Liddy: Those same smart, engineers, are today, creating industrial marvels to lessen our dependence on petroleum by products for which you are so thankful. All of our lives, health and the health of this planet will benefit from [biofuels] to power a Greenpeace vessel, oils [made from garbage/waste products] to lubricate the [chains] of the [bicycle] which transports me to the Earth Day ceremony, roads made from [concrete] which link me to the protest from my apartment heated by [wind/solar energy], [recycled] plastics [or tightly woven wool] which form my waterproof jacket so I can stay warm while I cling to the side of the Polar Pioneer like a barnicle, tires [made from the oil of recycled orange peels] that rotate on the surface of the [concrete] road which take me to the Earth Day celebration, [hemp] rope with which to scale industrial monoliths, shoes with [natural] rubber soles which grip the cold steel on the oil platform so I don’t slip into the ocean and drown. . .

    There is no single, silver bullet to get us out of this mess, but there ARE alternatives to petroleum. Science led us to oil, and science will lead us to something better. Elimination starts with reduction, and that is something we can all do right now.

    Blinded manipulated fools.

  • AlkiCruzr April 24, 2015 (10:23 pm)

    New plan, all the protests are to pull weeds in the median on Harbor ave.

  • Vince April 26, 2015 (2:21 pm)

    President Obama appointed Sally Jewell Secretary of the Interior in 2013. Several weeks ago she approved the disputed federal lease by Shell Oil for drilling in the arctic.

    Here is what President Obama said on nominating Sally Jewell (UW grad):

    “She is an expert on the energy and climate issues that are going to shape our future. She is committed to building our nation-to-nation relationship with Indian Country. She knows the link between conservation and good jobs. She knows that there’s no contradiction between being good stewards of the land and our economic progress; that in fact, those two things need to go hand in hand.”

    Strange how the opponents of Shell Oil don’t seem to mention that their lease has been given the Obama Administration seal of approval.

  • Dawn April 27, 2015 (11:15 am)

    Thank you for the info, Vince. Another reason for me to be disappointed with Obama.

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