On Sunday I had the distinct privilege of photographing ‘A Day For The Bay’ for Greenpeace Canada.

Some time ago, with no consultation and with no visible process, Vancouver became a shipping port for tar sands oil. Each week two tankers leave Vancouver Harbour with 700,000 barrels of crude oil, bound ultimately for California and China. The oil is piped from Alberta to Burnaby’s Kinder-Morgan Westbridge Terminal, and plans are in the works to increase shipping to 700,000 barrels a day.

Dozens of boats and hundreds of Canadians gathered at Second Beach in Stanley Park to rally against oil tanker traffic and call on the federal government to enact a legal tanker ban along the British Columbia coast.

“We are calling for a legislated tanker ban on the west coast of Canada”, said Stephanie Goodwin, BC director of Greenpeace Canada. “An accident here would be catastrophic for the local ecosystems, First Nations and the tens of thousands of families, kayakers and tourists that flock to these shores year-round. Our lush forests, beautiful coastal waters and marine animals cannot be sacrificed. Our national identity is at stake here – the risk of a spill is simply too great.”

One shocking figure that was shared with me on Sunday was this: the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska, was “only” 266,000 barrels. Another, from Stephanie Goodwin: “A clean-up of 15% is seen as a success by industry standards”.

Existing tanker traffic puts BC’s coast at risk of nearly three times the spillage of Exxon Valdez, twice a week. While spill scares seem largely hypothetical, we have only to look to the Gulf of Mexico, Prince William Sound and, recently, to our own Burrard Inlet for convincing arguments of eventuality. As Rex Weyler, former Greenpeace director, put it:

“One thing we know is that oil spills. When you put oil in a marine environment, it spills.

With quotations from British Columbians rally at Second Beach to oppose oil tanker traffic on the coast press release and statistics from Tar Sands Oil Shipments Threaten Canada’s West Coast and Beyond.