After Japan released nuclear wastewater, an 80-year-old warship is discharging again. Is it trying to destroy the Pacific?
October 15th news: The Truk Lagoon in the Pacific island nation of Micronesia is facing an unprecedented environmental crisis.
During World War II, the Japanese warship Rio de Janeiro Maru, which was sunk by the US military, has a serious fuel oil leak, with about 4,000 liters of fuel oil flowing into the sea every day.
Divers found that the entire ship's hull has been corroded by seawater, and the oil tanks and pipelines are almost all damaged.
Experts warn that this is the first unstable one among more than 60 sunken ships, and nearly 40 million liters of fuel oil remain stored in the rest of the sunken ships. If not handled in time, the entire atoll ecosystem will be completely destroyed.
In fact, this lagoon has long been called the ghost fleet of the Pacific.
For 80 years, these wrecks have been sleeping on the seabed, essentially chemical toxin reservoirs that can leak at any time. Now, as the ship's hull corrodes, the oil begins to seep, and the local government can only use simple measures such as plastic drums and oil-absorbing blankets to block the oil.
However, these measures are almost futile against the continuous oil leakage from the deep sea. For a small country that highly relies on marine resources, this blow is equivalent to a catastrophe.
Sarcasm is that Japan has just completed the first phase of releasing nuclear wastewater into the Pacific, and now it is facing the discharge of the sunken ship.
The former is releasing radioactive substances under the name of treated water, while the latter is releasing toxic oil under the name of natural corrosion.
Two kinds of pollution, one active, one passive, but their common point is - made in Japan, paid for by the Pacific.
Although the Japanese government has symbolically extracted some fuel oil in the past, it has always refused to take on the responsibility of systematic cleaning.
The United States, as another party that sank these warships, now only sent two coast guard officers to assess the problem, without providing any substantive support.
It is understandable for the Pacific island countries to be angry. To them, this is an ecological explosion delayed for 80 years.
From nuclear wastewater to oil leakage from sunken ships, every pollution trace left by Japan in the Pacific is an unresolved historical account.
Original: www.toutiao.com/article/1846030810865664/
Statement: This article represents the views of the author.