| HMAS Adelaide in her heyday - fighting global terrorism |
With moments to go, red smoke plumed into the air and the five-minute warning siren bleated from a small boat. But five minutes passed, and we got nothing. No promised pyrotechnics (which I've never seen the point of during the day); absolutely nothing happened. The news stations scampered to find something to talk about and the Adelaide waited; listing widely but gently in the wind.
It turned out that a huge pod of playful dolphins had ventured into the exclusion zone, no doubt curious over the activity and masses of people and boats in their playpen. The scuttling had been scuttled. I can relate; if I had a buck for every time my best-laid plans have been scuttled by a bunch of nosy dolphins.
At least 50 of these little sea monkeys held up the process for a good hour and a half, having a great old time leaping about in the water and just generally being cute. It is always entertaining listening to TV anchors trying desperately to find something to talk about when all they are showing the viewing audience is an ocean bubbling with white froth and the occasional dolphin doing a triple pike backflip. If only those ocean-faring creatures knew the chaos they were creating, and how happy they were making the greenies. Perhaps it was Bob Brown and his cronies dressed in sleek, grey inflatable pvc suits.
You'd think the greenies would be happy about the scuttling. The HMAS Adelaide will create an artificial reef, a human-made underwater structure that is generally built to control erosion from the shore and to promote marine life in a sea floor that otherwise doesn't have anything very exciting going on. It's ironic that an attraction named after the city of Adelaide is being used for the purpose of tourism.
Also ironic is that warships like the Adelaide are part of the reason insufferable greenies are able to whinge endlessly to the media. If we didn't ship troops off to wars on these frigates back in the day, and still to this day, we'd likely be a communist country by now. And I would love to see Bob Brown and his deluded cohorts try and whinge about the government under a communist regime.
While waiting for the main event, Sky News passed the time talking to a woman who seemed to be from Avoca Tourism, who waxed lyrical about the area and how cool it is having hundreds of dolphins just off shore, as if it happened everyday. And if I didn't know any better, I would say that the dolphins were an 11th hour PR stunt by the Avoca Tourism Board. It felt like a PR stunt, but I have no idea how that would have been carried out. Perhaps there is an illegal Hire-a-Dolphin company operating on the Central Coast.
Sky News also spoke to two insane, unreasonable green activists, who answered every questions from a journalist with "it's leaking lead paint! OMG! We're all gonna die!!", which it's not, and we're not, but I suppose you need to come up with something - anything - when you've got nothing relevant to say.
Aside from the whinging of the activists - who tried to steal the Adelaide's thunder - I thought it was so sad that, instead of talking about the rich history of the frigate and the Royal Australian Navy, Sky News gave all the airtime to tourism folk and nutty environmentalists. I would have liked to hear the views of someone who had served on the ship perhaps.
Some ADF officers spent years on the frigate, serving their country, fighting wars in our name. And on the day that we should be talking about its history, all the media is concerned about is its environmental impact (which is negligible) and how much money will be invested in the area through the ship's new role as a tourist attraction.
The HMAS Adelaide fought in wars for Australia. It took just 60 seconds for her to sink to the floor of the ocean. No great movement in the water, just a very fast and smooth ride to start her new life.
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