Engineer on Danish Merchant ships, Engineer on J.Lauritzen Drilling Ship, N.L. Sperry Sun Directional drilling and Survey engineer.
In 1986 I was fed up, with the offshore drilling industry, the amount of money they spent on getting the holes drilled and none of it spent on taking waste back to shore, always seeing oilslicks when looking over the ocean. I decided to join the Merchant ships again, same thing, oily bilge water being pumped overboard and all waste dumped over the side. While looking for shore based work I ended up with Greenpeace Denmark.
I joined Greenpeace Denmark as volunteer in 1986, helping to mail merchandise, answering phonecalls and other odd jobs around the office. In 1987 I sent my CV to Greenpeace Marine Services, and joined M/V Sirius in February 1987. I have worked on Greenpeace Ships for almost 10 years.
An action on the Sellafield Nuclear Reprocessing plant in 1987 was my first encounter with the Nuclear industry, an impression that has kept me with Greenpeace. We blocked one of their discharge pipes, and disrupted their discharge of radioactive waste for a couple of days. Greenpeace was fined heavily, the Captain and Campaigner went to jail. Of the many campaigns I have been involved with since then, the visit to the Marshall Islands on Rainbow Warrior II and meeting up with the people from Rongelap effected me most. The Rainbow Warrior II's last work was to move them from their highly radioactive Island (American atmospheric testing in 1954) to Mejato. The deadly consequence of the test (thyroid cancer etc.) still affecting the people on Mejato will be with me forever.
I often get asked questions about the dangers involved in taking part in one of our actions. My feeling is that it is more dangerous to do nothing.
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