As I was walking along the shore at Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge, I saw a layer of oil exposed from the incoming tide. I was photographing it when one of the four-wheelers stopped and the guy started calling out to me. Because of the wind I couldn’t hear him so I walked over to hear what he was saying.
He told me he was a supervisor from Crowder, the current BP contractor corporation providing clean-up on the Alabama Gulf Coast. Just today, he said, he found that particular layer of oil at the water’s edge. He had marked it with flags and had shown his crew, who he related wanted to immediately scoop it off the beach. As he was telling me about everything he and the contractors were doing to make the beach better, he stopped talking for a moment, looked down the beach and said, “Those wildlife officers are watching us.” “So what?” I replied. He went on to tell me that the wildlife officers employed by the US Fish and Wildlife agency did not particularly like the contractors. “Oh,” I pondered out loud.
As the contractor was driving off, I looked up and saw the most amazing clouds over the dunes. Like a magnet, they drew me in. While avoiding sea oats, I walked to the base of the dune and took a few photographs. I turned and walked back toward shore and the wildlife officers were wheeling toward me. In a friendly wave, I greeted them.
I had missed the signs professing the area was closed. Maybe it was the rapture of beautiful clouds or my foggy brain still in recovery from food poisoning Sunday night, regardless I was approached by both armed officers who asked if I had seen the signs. The signs are spaced at 100++ foot intervals along the dune line and I had wandered between two signs, no more than 20 feet into the ‘closed’ area.
Okay, of all the people who visit the refuge I’m the last person who would do anything to harm the environment or wildlife there. I’ve walked through 100 degree temperatures for miles through the center of the refuge to get images and video of the heavy machines hauling the beach away during the invasion of the oil. I’ve written passionately about wildlife and wild places and included my work from the oil spill in my recently published book, Place of Spirit. Not intending to do any harm but rather capture the beauty of this place was no excuse. I had entered the NO NO zone. But seriously. Not a warning or verbal reprimand? I wasn’t on the dune, was careful about where I stepped and had barely entered closed area.
When I explained all of this to the officers they said they had a lot of trouble with the contractors and so had to be very strict about anyone crossing the (invisible) line. Oh….so I was being made an example of for the contractors. And it worked. As the officer was writing me a ticket, a tractor driver came up and the officer stepped out of the way…INTO THE FORBIDDEN ZONE. I made a comment about being careful not to step into the closed area, with humor, and he realized he also was in the no trespassing area and so stepped back out of it while continuing to write the ticket…the $75 ticket.
As I walked back to my car I knew that in ‘normal’ times I would have received a verbal warning, not a ticket. I have no issue paying the fine. Each of those 20 feet cost me $3.75, a small price to pay for realizing just how stressed relations are between people trying to protect the environment and those who work for people who nearly annihilated the environment on the Gulf Coast. It seems that wildlife officers have it ‘in’ for contractors, some of whom are careless. And people like me, who adore nature and work diligently to document and share the seriousness of this on-going oil spill event (paying our own expenses) get caught in the middle of some unholy war between the good guys and those who work for the bad guys.
The contract workers are not the enemy Mr. Wildlife Officers (please tell your bosses). Neither are nature-lovers enraptured by beautiful clouds.
