‘Jeedara’ - The Film

[Music] [Music] one of the most devastating environmental disasters ever to hit us shores disaster in the Gulf of Mexico occurred the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig killed 11 workers and then spilled more than 3 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico so far the satellite photos from NASA take a look at these they show what it looks like from space breaking news tonight they they can't stop that oil spill into the Gulf of Mexico start to sink into this news right here it's a mess and unfortunately it's getting worse in 2010 the whole world watched in despair as deepwater horizon a deep-sea offshore oil rig operated by petroleum giant BP suffered a catastrophic accident in the Gulf of Mexico leading to the deaths of 11 workers over the following 87 days the rig's pipeline that ran deep into the ocean bed of the Gulf of Mexico spilled approximately 4.9 million barrels of oil into the ocean marine life was devastated local fisheries and the tourism industry were wrecked and local communities were left desolate with tens of thousands of people out of work BP spill has gone down in history as one of the worst environmental disasters and its effects are still being felt today [Music] not more than six months after the Gulf spill on the other side of the planet the Australian government signed off on the leasing of multiple sites for offshore oil exploration and soon enough BP were announcing similar plans to drill for oil in the Great Australian Bight [Music] you [Music] in 2016 the Wilderness Society the Bob Brown Foundation and Sea Shepherd Australia announced the launch of Operation Jedi a campaign that would see Sea Shepherd's flagship vessel the Steve Irwin depart Melbourne and sail to the Great Australian Bight to document and showcase the natural beauty of the region we'd run a similar style campaign of the Kimberley Coast where we took the state bill and and the mission there was to showcase you know what we would all lose if a big gas hub was in that part of the region that was the whole idea of this campaign was to take the steve-o and along the Great Australian Bight it would have been 2013 and I was on a committee called the Great Australian Bight Marine Park and Saadat of committee and one day on the agenda suddenly BP appeared and a number of representatives came in and made a presentation to the committee and essentially outlined their plans to drill in the grocery and bite Marine Park I was the environment rip on that committee and went away you know fairly concerned about I guess the future for this area you know right I felt that this has to be stopped we're gonna have to build a large campaign well I got to know about it through Jeff Hanson of say Shepherd and Peter Owen and the South Australian Wilderness Society I knew though getting together to combat they'd pay his intention to bring the oil rig into the Great Australian Bight and wanted my foundation to join in on that fight because it had to become national and international and so all shoulders to the wheel operation general would see the Steve and her international volunteer crew head west from Melbourne right into the heart of the Great Australian Bight over several weeks the Stevo and crew aimed to explore and document some of the most remote regions of the Bight in order to showcase the nature and wildlife of the region places like the noise reef miles of San Francis and Pearson Isles would be visited areas that very few Australians had heard of or seen documented let alone visited along with the more remote offshore islands of the Bight the team would also visit some of the landmarks of the region such as Fowler's by Kangaroo Island and the iconic bunda cliffs of the nullabor wilderness home to one of the world's most important Southern Right Whale nurseries joining the voyage was bana lorry a moaning Aboriginal elder and while song man from the Great Australian Bight [Music] captaining the Steve Irwin was beyond allure blink a highly experienced sailor who has ventured across the world's oceans with the Navy as well as with Sea Shepherd on multiple campaigns and I first started hearing our operation together I kind of had to look on the map where oh where is the Great Australian Bight and I think with me there's a lot of people that actually they might know about the greatest rallyin bite they might be able to more or less people in on the map where it is but they don't really have any idea or what kind of area these and and what we were looking at and you know how remote and how rough and the kind of coastline he can expect before we Devon departed you know names of places Pearson Island some Francis Isles noise reef didn't know how to spell them never heard of them before and yet here we were on this expedition to showcase the beauty of these places [Music] [Music] we left Williamstown at ships operations base in early August and made paths for the greatest rainbow [Music] we knew that getting the steve-o and into the bike was going to be a big ask yeah we pulled out every stop that we could our team rally crew our staff donors to make this campaign possible [Music] follow the Sun which way the wind this day's done nope in Scotland in 1975 the Steve Irwin first served as a Scottish fisheries patrol vessel before being bought by Sea Shepherd in 2007 since then the Steve Irwin has become an icon for Sea Shepherd's campaigns defending the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary where she along with other sea Shepherd vessels played a vital role in saving the lives of over 6,000 miles from the harpoons of the illegal Japanese whaling fleet [Music] [Music] having departed Melbourne but even her crew faced their first challenge the notorious weather and sea conditions at the Great Australian Bight when you prepare for operation general I think the whole campaign was based more or less based on the fact that we had to have nice weather so when you go to Vermont places like this let it be the greatest rally inviter on time to go into Arctic it doesn't really matter but you need to be prepared for bad weather and all the plans we had for this campaign was to showcase the beauty of the area so every single day we had to look at the weather and what it was going to do and have our fingers crossed that the weather would be good [Music] home of some of the roughest seas in the southern hemisphere the Great Australian Bight is famous for its blistering winds and huge swells which can reach up to 20 metres high at the moment we're heading towards a bit of a storm about three to four meters well sometimes a bit bigger just gonna put on some Mustang suits and head out that yeah Steve Irwin just and get a taste of the rough seas that we have any great Australian vibe [Music] [Music] mother nature has so far prevented industry from establishing itself in these waters but with oil and gas fields running dry in other locations companies like BP have cast their eyes to areas once thought too risky to work in for their plan VP commissioned a huge 750 million dollar special-purpose drilling rig named the ocean Great White the drilling would see the great white spin its pipe over 2 kilometers down into the depths of the Southern Ocean in order to reach the ocean floor it would then drill another 2 to 3 kilometers deeper into the Earth's core in search of oil aided by GPS thrusters would keep the floating platform in place however with those swells of up to 20 meters many were skeptical of the safety of BP's infrastructure the operation would be one of the riskiest oil exploration projects ever attempted when we were out to sea on the Stevo and we're in four or five metre swells and we were you know in the tail end of a storm coming through but further south of us the seas were much bigger em and it said on the charts you know 15 20 meter swells which is just huge but that's not uncommon in the Great Australian Bight so you imagine that rig which is not fixed in position to a seafloor and having these massive swells coming up it's just insanity like how can you put that plan into place and go yep she'll be right I mean come on that's just absolutely nuts [Music] [Music] the Great Australian Bight is a truly remarkable place one of the most pristine ocean environments left on earth it is a haven for wild pitch plants birds marine mammals and an array of invertebrate ecosystems what happens in the Bight impacts species survival at the global level in recognition at the bites great significance vast areas are now protected with 19 marine parks in South Australian waters and extensive Commonwealth marine reserves throughout the entire region with the swells having died down the Steve Owen sailed onwards to the first stop of operation jet arow the noise archipelago Marine Park [Music] the largest Marine Park in South Australian waters the archipelago is one of the highlights of South Australia's marine parks network and is acclaimed by marine scientists as a biodiversity hotspot [Music] we're now in the heart of the North Reef Marine Sanctuary one of the many factories inside the North Point archipelago Marine Park would be a very significant Australian sea line breeding colony here and what's underneath this is a huge limestone reef there's probably some of the richest marine biodiversity across southern Australia when we arrived at noise you know I was not really a big sea day but there was still a lot of swell coming up in these beautiful waves peeling over that we could seaside on and they were just you know you could take a million photos of the now just breathtaking [Music] it just gave me this sense of our guest house soft humans are when you know we like our houses and our nice woollen jumpers and to keep warm and and content and here these animals are really living out in a wild natural raw environment the outermost island of the archipelago is Fenelon island an important habitat for seabirds and shorebirds including the endangered Osprey rare rock parrot the cape barren geese the little penguin in migratory oceanic birds including albatross prions and petrels [Music] [Music] back in 2006 we've got a commitment for the South Australian government to assess many of South Australia's offshore islands for for witness protection and so what's called the witness Advisory Committee which is a committee set up under the witness protection act of statutory committee came out to some of the islands and and had to look at the the witness values here and they were considered very high and so it took some time it took five or six years and - until we finally got 26 or so of the offshore islands the investigator group of islands in the noise archipelago alludes to some Frances ours I don't know without where we are the outermost group until we've got all of those islands proclaimed witness protection areas piece of legislation which is the highest highest level of protection available under South Australian law [Laughter] the next stop for the Steve was Pearson Ireland best known for its wild population of curious Australian sea lions [Music] [Music] [Music] hello money part of the greater offshore islands Pearson Island was accorded wilderness protection in 2011 due to its precious flora and fauna including the Australian sea lines long nose fur seals and migratory birds as well as the friendly endemic locals the Pearson Island rock wallabies [Music] well never in my wildest dreams I never dream of coming to a place like this but you know it's just I'm blown away by it because it's incredible so incredible it's a home of the seal the seal is a really very friendly sea lion since this is Elm and the rock wallabies at Olivia just amazing to see them hopping around and on this island a big granite outcropping Wow what can I say most Australians wouldn't even know what Pizza no mice the ones that do have only ever seen is a couple of dots on a map yet these animals here they see lines and the rock wallabies this is at home this is where they live this is where they born and give birth and they've been doing so for thousands of years this is untouched wilderness and you know an oil spill off this coast here would be devastating well the reality is that much of the southern Australian coastline could be damaged by oil should BP and other companies be allowed to carry out high-risk drilling in the Bight and this entire region is now covered in offshore island rudeness areas and marine sanctuaries which is in recognition of the incredible importance ecologically of the southern Australian coast of much of the Great Australian Bight there couldn't be a worse place to be trying to industrialize [Music] [Music] you imagine lots and lots of ocean and you think oh yeah it's just seeing devoid of life and not much happening here but then you come to these offshore island groups and then micro you know ecosystems just going off like little Galapagos Islands everywhere and then surrounding these islands is just reefs and corals with numerous fish species and sharks like great whites and mako sharks it's just it's alive it's a treasure it's a real treasure just there you know in today's oceans that's that's really rare to have places like that that still exist [Music] [Music] the following day the Steve and her crew headed back southeast to Port Adelaide they were welcomed by a crowd of friendly locals and members of the public in support of the Great Australian Bight alliances opposition to BP's drilling plans [Music] [Music] the Steve welcomed locals aboard to see film captured in the bite so far and to explain the goals of operation Jedi upon arrival the crew was also met by national media cleaned to get the latest on the trip Port Adelaide also welcomed several new crew members including Australian musical icon John Butler a longtime supporter and advocate for conservation and Aboriginal heritage [Music] for the next leg of the campaign the Great Australian Bight Alliance welcome to board prominent members of community environmentalists and politicians in order to give them my firsthand natural experience of the Great Australian Bight after three days in Port Adelaide the Steve departed with its new crew and headed to Kangaroo Island guests will walk through BP's drilling plans and how a spill would impact on the South Australian economy including its important tourism and fishing industries the tourism in South Australia is worth about 1.2 billion dollars a year creating 10,000 plus jobs now one of the jewels that people are drawn to for that South Australian tourism is kangaroo ala one of the most popular tourist destinations in Australia Kangaroo Island is Australia's third-largest Ireland [Music] the thriving tourism industry on the island relies heavily on its scenic coastline with visitors coming from all around the world to see its famous beaches and wildlife [Music] [Music] Kangaroo Island seal by has a colony of 1000s trail E&C lines it is an important breeding site for this endangered marine mammal [Music] [Music] [Music] only 14,000 of these remarkable seals remain and the Great Australian Bight is pivotal to their survival [Music] so the Great Australian Bight is one of the last wild places in here sealed by Kangaroo Island another remarkable wild place we have endangered Australian sea lions coming in here we've got mothers coming in giving birth to their pups and Paul seals coming together and challenging each other and biting this is stuff that we can be here in this wild environment and witness and see and it goes about a stay as though we're not here it's just so special and so remarkable to witness it if you places left on the planet where you can see this stuff and we've got a protector [Music] the kangaroo island Cana me is very fragile our tourism and our iconic status are all linked in with their agriculture and erricka culture so the the industry is actually a mono industry an oil spill of the magnitude that is possible from the BP drilling would totally ruin our economy forever I can't see us ever recovering [Music] one of the things that really worried me because sometimes you get companies just being honest without even knowing it and that was the comment that BP made that if they had another major oil spill in the bide their answer that that was all we're finished well that's fantastic isn't it they're finished and so we who cleans up who pays for that if they go into bankruptcy their insurance companies and their underwriters are going to backtrack at a thousand mile an hour and we'll be left to clean up the mess it's just not worth it our government needs to really start to look at this very very closely [Music] the final destination of the trip would be the famous bunda cliffs in order to access this remote cliff line the Steve Irwin anchored in Fowler's Bay [Music] the crew was treated to a tour of the base coastline including a visit from a few playful locals [Music] the iconic bunda cliffs have long served as a postcard for the Great Australian by towering 60 to 100 metres high and stretching 100 kilometres from South Australia across the border into Western Australia the cliffs provide a safe haven for one of the world's most important Southern Right Whale nurseries the head of the bite is a critical gathering area for this endangered species with up to half the Australian population migrating to the region in winter months where mother whales nursed their newborn calves to a healthy weight before setting off on their summer trip south to Antarctica [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Laughter] to go to the head of the bite and stand there and in your peripheral vision from one side to the other seeing 30 40 50 mother and calf pairs southern right whales and you can stand there from 9 o'clock in the morning to 5 o'clock in the afternoon and constantly see whales no with binoculars with your naked eye to staying there looking at whales below going about their day seeing mothers come together with their young and you can just imagine just like us the mothers stop and the kids get off and play and hang out together where else can you see that the bunda cliffs have special significance for Bana Laurie and the moaning people the aboriginal search traditional lands lie in the coastal regions of the Great Australian Bight Gloria [Music] see with me [Music] jitter is a very special and you know sacred whale and mythical being in the creature so we see that the jitter is that said yoga mama into creation times the great-grandfather came to give life and made it with the Seven Sisters and we became the children and of Seven Sisters so we're all one family pretty much so you know so you know our responded in duties is to now is to be the voice for the whale and the voice the guardian protector what we've been doing for you know thousands of years have people have looked after slaying and take care of it and you know I feel that BP and all that mother's mantra duties that I'm burying really angry in my heart that I don't want these people coming in there get a mess of the marine countries registering invite you know the land that we want to share with everybody else and teach people about our connection air we connect to the earth now we connect to the whales and it's like I said is very sacred to us the ocean is sacred this land is sacred I feel so amazing he said nebulous I know this is a country where my learning people overall and our spirits will always be in this in this land and we need to protect our spirit and the spiritual log are frozen our ancestors are sylia with me buona Laurie is a burning elder he's he's a whale song man he speaks for the Nullarbor he speaks for the Great Australian Bight operation jitter is essentially an honor of Boehner and the moaning dreaming the stories about jitter of the white whale so it was an incredible experience when we're at the head of the bar and and Vanowen said on the cliffs and we had a whitewash right there [Music] and literally went up and down in front of Boehner for hours and to watch that was an amazing experience and it just emphasized the importance of what we're doing you know the significance of this area the connection that Boehner has to the area a connection that unfortunately you know for a lot of a lot of us now is lost as the Steve Irwin departed the bunda cliffs the at sea component of operation jet era came to a close after three weeks of exploring the wilderness and grandness of the Great Australian Bight it was time to return to Melbourne where the alliance members would begin showcasing what they saw experienced and documented [Music] BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico saw an estimated 800 million litres of oil spill into the marine ecosystem over 87 days resulting in the deaths of an estimated 800,000 birds 75 thousand whales and dolphins and millions of fish in 2015 the Wilderness Society in South Australia commissioned the production of an oil spill model in order to predict the effects of a spill in the Bight and it showed that if there was a blowout in the greatest rain bite depending on the time of year and the currents the spill could reach as far as the West Australian coast all of southern Australia Tasmania and as far as you know the tar cayenne and Victoria will all be covered in oil in late 2016 BP released its own modelling revealing that a Deepwater Horizon type spill in the white could indeed see oil spreading around the Australian coastline for thousands of kilometres BP spill report showed that stopping the flow of oil would take more than 35 days and a cleanup would take more than four months the spill modelling of BP is released has shown that a spill would reach all of South Australia's coasts Western Australia Tasmania Victoria and even up as far as New South Wales coast and these offshore island groups that we've seen places like Pearson that would be covered and places like kangaroo on the jewel and South Australian Tourism between ninety and a hundred percent would be hit by oil that's bp's own spill modelling that has shown the woman society's commission report to be very very conservative if that's not enough to stop this project and i don't know what is you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the threat isn't temporary if there's an oil spill here it will destroy much of the ecosystem of this magnificent part of the world's oceans which is largely intact and that's rare in itself for a long long time to come for lifetimes and it'll only happened if we're so lazy we're so thoughtless we're so careless that we allow BP to snatch a part of Australia's environmental Commons which belong to all the people of Australia and all future generations of people as well as our fellow creatures in this great country of ours the great robot Marine Park was set aside to protect one of the most significance of the night long nurseries in the world to allow BP to to push to carry out this type of high-risk activity in one of the most significant marine parks certainly in Australian waters if not the world is madness it is it's completely irresponsible myself I'm very much afraid that all that matters is money in power so I think it's very possible that BP will get the go-ahead then they will start bringing this rig down well if this happens and we're not done yet I hope he's ready for a fight because we're just not going to give up like that so to me this is a war against nature we have to all jump in and fight with everything we possibly have and it's clear that you know losing this one against BP from a love of nature from an opponent's ability to support life losing this one is simply not an option [Music] I'm a moaning song men and lawmen and a protector of the greatest trillion bytes and my responsibilities and duties is to protect the whales now say to your BP if you're going to come to them the Great Australian Bight well we're gonna fight you all the way we're gonna fight you all you all the way till you leave this country because you're not welcome here I'm sorry to say you're not welcome [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] I wish I was a bird like in albatross riding over the ocean to see what's going on gliding day and night under the sobbing from the Milky Way to the ocean and the spray of the we are your friend your sister and your guardian we are your voice your brother we are the Sea Shepherd if the oceans we must rotate its pristine and so incredible get a bigger loop 1 July Julia Berlin we are your friend your sister and your [Music] we are your boys your brother we are the Sea Shepherd it's an oceans we must protect its pristine and so we credible come on every bar don't say that [Music] come on [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Sea Shepherd

Views: 118,818

Rating: 4.877387 out of 5

Keywords: Sea Shepherd, Great Australian Bight, jeedara, climate change, australia

Id: zCFlzTlyTes

Length: 46min 23sec (2783 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 07 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/SquareGravy]

Didnt this come out last year? Or was that like a teaser? I thought I remember seeing this before.