There's Plenty More Pikes in the Sea

While one aspect of the kindly ones are marching in centres around the country, another older fury is stirring again, thanks to Listener writer Rebecca Macfie's new book Tragedy at Pike River Mine.

NBR has an excerpt of the book here, and NatRad has an interview with her by a wet dish cloth Richard Langston (Seriously, he's become institutionalised with the "So, how does that make you feel?" schtick that he passed off as current affairs).

From what I've grabbed from the narrative so far, there's plenty of places where bucks should have stopped, and didn't. New Zealand Oil and Gas, who passed off mutton as lamb to the NZ stock exchange. Pike River's Board of Directors who signed off on prospectuses with misleading information on methane levels. The ineffective Department of Labour. The blood from a stone CEO.

And, of course, no-one paid any attention to the geologists.

I can't wait to read the book in its entirety. Between Pike River and the Rena, there's no confidence in the regulatory or business structures, or trust in over-inflated economic benefits of any more novel drilling techniques. Legislating a 500 metre exclusive economic zone in NZ waters around drilling platforms won't prevent another (almost inevitable) loss of life.

And if your kids have asked you for a cowboy outfit for Xmas, I suggest NZ and Gas.