Andrew Watson: The 'most influential' black footballer for decades lost to history

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  By Andrew Aloia BBC Sport Last updated on 11 October 2021 11 October 2021 . From the section Football Watson was a trailblazer who helped transform how football was played There are two murals of black footballers facing one another across an alleyway in Glasgow. One helped shape football as we know it, the other is Pele. Andrew Watson captained Scotland to a 6-1 win over England on his debut in 1881. He was a pioneer, the world's first black international, but for more than a century the significance of his achievements went unrecognised. Research conducted over the past three decades has left us with some biographical details: a man descended of slaves and of those who enslaved them, born in Guyana, raised to become an English gentleman and famed as one of Scottish football's first icons. And yet today, 100 years on from his death aged 64, Watson remains something of an enigma, the picture built around him a fractured one. His grainy, faded, sepia image evokes many differen
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Fishermen, oyster farmers fear power-generating ship will kill business

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 18 June 2021 - 12:19

BY REUTERS
The seafood sellers fear the 415 megawatt ship — to be moored for two decades at Saldanha Bay, 140km north of Cape Town — will pump hot water into the bay and make endless noise, spoiling farmed oysters and scaring off fish as Africa's most industrialised country scrambles to fix electricity problems.
The seafood sellers fear the 415 megawatt ship — to be moored for two decades at Saldanha Bay, 140km north of Cape Town — will pump hot water into the bay and make endless noise, spoiling farmed oysters and scaring off fish as Africa's most industrialised country scrambles to fix electricity problems.
Image: http://www.karpowership.com/en/photos

A floating gas-turbine generator meant to alleviate SA's crippling power cuts has run into objections by oyster farmers and small-scale fishermen, who fear the environmental damage will destroy their livelihoods.

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The seafood sellers fear the 415 megawatt ship — to be moored for two decades at Saldanha Bay, 140km north of Cape Town — will pump hot water into the bay and make endless noise, spoiling farmed oysters and scaring off fish as Africa's most industrialised country scrambles to fix electricity problems.

Responding to complaints by the Green Connection environmental justice group, the South African government on June 11 suspended an environmental authorisation application for operator Karpowership in Saldanha Bay. It cited the Green Connection's allegation that Karpowership failed to conduct specialist studies on underwater engine noise.

“Our team believes that this complaint is without merit,” Karpowership SA spokesperson Kay Sexwale said on Wednesday.

Saldanha Bay is SA's first sea-based aquaculture zone, with 16 new entrants welcomed last year to an industry worth around one billion rand ($72 million) annually, Fisheries Department officials said.

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A few minutes from the slipway, multicoloured buoys and floating black rafts help pinpoint different farm locations, as workers pull up long lines of clinging mussels or exotic oysters fattened in the nutrient-rich waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

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“We don't believe it can just be benign, sitting there, because it is generating hot water and it is generating a noise factor which can affect the organisms we cultivate,” said Kevin Ruck, owner of Blue Sapphire Pearls oyster farm and a trained marine biologist.

Ruck is worried that hot water discharge from the Karpowership vessel may stimulate harmful algae blooms that could render his succulent oysters inedible.

Started in 2008, his company harvests up to a million Pacific oysters a year, mainly for the domestic market, but also exported live to China.

In February, scientists warned that industrial noise beneath the ocean surface was disrupting marine animals' ability to mate, feed and even evade predators.

But prolonged delays to Karpowership's bid, which includes more ships at two east coast ports, could disrupt SA's plan to plug its energy shortfall with 2,000MW of emergency power.

Karpowership SA said its environmental impact assessments for all three sites “demonstrate little impact to the surrounding air and water environments.”

But, for Saldanha Bay skipper Christie Links, the risks are too great.

“Who says the many fish species we depend on will still come into the bay if Karpowership is here?”  

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