people

(quote)

World’s Youngest Sailor Sets Sail Under the Sea Shepherd Flag - Laura Dekker has been handed the Sea Shepherd Jolly Roger by Sea Shepherd Netherlands Director Geert Vons in Den Osse.

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society Founder and President, Captain Paul Watson, along with Laurens de Groot, had a unique conversation around midnight on August 3, 2010 while driving north on Highway 405 from San Clemente to Los Angeles, California. It was early morning in the small Dutch harbor of Den Ostse in the Netherlands when Captain Watson called Laura Dekker—a 14-year-old sailor from the Netherlands—just as she was setting out with her 38-foot sailing yacht Guppy to begin her quest to be the youngest sailor to circumnavigate the globe solo.

Dekker was born on her parent’s sailing yacht off the coast of New Zealand. She has already crossed the North Sea solo at the age of thirteen. Two months ago, Dekker met with Sea Shepherd Netherlands Director Geert Vons and Laurens de Groot in the Sea Shepherd Amsterdam office. She asked if she could fly the Sea Shepherd flag and promote the efforts of Sea Shepherd during her voyage.

Vons, de Groot, and everyone else within Sea Shepherd Netherlands and Sea Shepherd International were immediately enthusiastic.  read more »

Epic Voyage
The Plastiki and crew have reached the end of their epic voyage which has taken them through the Pacific Ocean on an 8,000 nautical mile adventure lasting over 130 days. On Jul 26, 2010, 'plastiki' reached its final destination, sailing its way into Sydney Harbour, bringing with it a warning on pollution & on plastic waste in the oceans.

quote)

The Plastiki is a distinctive, one-of-a-kind 60-foot (20m) catamaran made out of 12,500 reclaimed plastic bottles and other recycled PET plastic and waste products.The craft was built using cradle to cradle design philosophies and features many renewable energy systems, including solar panels, wind and trailing propeller turbines, and bicycle generators.

On March 20, 2010, the sailing vessel set off from San Francisco, California with a six-man crew, including David de Rothschild, to sail across the Pacific Ocean. The expedition projected landfall in Sydney, Australia and included plans to visit several sites en route of ecological importance or which were susceptible to environmental issues caused by global warming, for instance the current sea level rise, ocean acidification and marine pollution.  read more »

(quote)

Bertrand Piccard - "The pioneer is not always the one who succeeds, but the one who is not scared to fail." 'Zephyr is the world's first and only truly persistent aeroplane,' said Neville Salkeld, MD of QinetiQ's UK Technology Solutions Group. This amazing aircraft, launched by hand, can provide low-cost, non-stop surveillance over persistent surveillance and communications capability measured in terms of weeks, if not months. Not only is Zephyr game-changing technology, it is also significantly more cost effective to manufacture and deploy than traditional aircraft and satellites.'

British solar-powered unmanned drone finally lands after flying non-stop for two weeks: It has more than doubled the unofficial record of more than 82 hours already held by Zephyr and has smashed the official record of more than 30 hours set in 2001  read more »

(quote)

World's First Ban on Shark Fin Makes Hawaii Global Leader in Shark Conservation
HONOLULU, June 30 /PRNewswire/ -- On the eve of the State of Hawaii becoming the first jurisdiction to ban sales of shark fin soup, local and international conservation groups praised the ground-breaking move as a first step to halting the decimation of global shark stocks.

Fins from up to 70 million sharks a year are used for shark fin soup often with the bodies of the animal dumped overboard dead or alive. In a recent study the world's top shark scientists (IUCN Shark Specialist Group) reported that of 64 species of open ocean sharks and rays 32% are "threatened with extinction," primarily due to overfishing. In addition, 24% were "near threatened," while another 25% could not be assessed due to lack of data. Yet only 3 species have any kind of international protection and the UN CITES convention recently declined to take any action due to opposition led by Japan.  read more »

(quote)

For a guy who had just been knocked out of a major tournament, Roger Federer seemed remarkably composed. For a 16-time Grand Slam singles champion, he was almost jovial. The first question in his postmatch interview following a loss to Robin Soderling in the quarterfinals at Roland Garros concerned his level of disappointment. "Well, disappointed to a certain degree," Federer answered. "I don't think I played a bad match, so it's easier to go out this way. I thought he came up with some great tennis. It's a touch easier to digest this way."

Roger Federer even joked when the topic of his 23 consecutive Grand Slam semifinals appearances -- an all-time streak ended by Soderling -- came up. "It was a great run," Federer said. "Now I've got the quarterfinal streak going, I guess." When the assembled media laughed, Federer even smiled.

 read more »

May all World War II veterans and victims rest in peace.

(June 20, 2010) Edith Shain, the nurse in Alfred Eisenstead's famous Victory over Japan Day In Times Square photo, died in Los Angeles. She was 91.

Photos courtesy of Alfred Eisenstaedt / Getty

Original Source: hollywoodmemoir.com