The Adriatic ranges- the sea has its limits after all

posidonija-kornati-posidonia-oceanica

Written by Prof. Dr. Ivo Babić

What are, in fact, the ranges of the Adriatic?
Its surface area is 138,595 km², its length is 870 km, its average width is 159.3 km
and average depth is 173 m.

Since the Adriatic is not too wide, in exceptionally clear weather, on stormy days after rain, it is possible, it is said, to notice the mountains on the Italian coast. From the island of Palagruža, in the darkness at night, the blinking lights of cars can be seen on the slopes of Monte Gargano, and I heard that from Bari, where the Adriatic is narrower, you can see the mountains in Albania. Pictures of Biokov seen from Monte Gargano were also published. Once upon a time, with favorable and fair winds, it was possible to sail to the other side of the Adriatic in one day; it is possible to fly over it by plane in less than half an hour.

Michel de Montaigne also mentions birds that fly from one side of the Adriatic to the other. (1) Fish also swim in both directions. Pilgrims from the east coast directed their hopes across the sea: to the sanctuary of San Michele in Gargano, to the Church of St. Nicholas in Bari and to the Holy House in Loreto. However, from the Italian side, hailstorms can come down and witches fly in, which was defended against by the persistent ringing of bells.

Many shipwrecked people found shelter on the eastern coast of the Adriatic

In the legend of St. Helena, one nail from the cross thrown into the sea calmed the dangerous whirlpool in the Adriatic.

King Richard the Lionheart is said to have taken refuge in Lokrum. It is said that the storm also forced St. Francis to the east coast; in 1177, Pope Alexander III, due to the storm, stopped at Palagruža and then stopped in Zadar. Winds can surprise; in Kvarner, there can be a storm even in the middle of the summer. It is true that the Adriatic is a relatively calm sea and that there is no longer a great risk of shipwrecks, even though they still happen today; Collisions between speedboats and yachts are commonplace, and swimmers hit by motorboats are also injured. At the end of the 20th century, the Adriatic Sea was dangerous for Albanian immigrants who tried to reach the Italian coast in small boats. Invasions of migrants from the southern shores of the Mediterranean are coming.

Although, thanks to more stable and safer ship structures, shipwrecks are no longer such a big problem, there is always the possibility of a breakdown caused by human or technical error. Regarding the number of sunken ships, the Mediterranean ranks second among maritime regions. From 2011 to 2017, 139 severe maritime accidents – sinkings, strandings and collisions – were recorded in the Adriatic Sea (2).

Satellite images of the Adriatic facilitate the sale of state assets

The Adriatic is only the northern arm of the Mediterranean, paraphrasing Fernando Braudel, the deepest part of the European continent. Today, we are in the phase of space contraction due to increasingly heavy and faster traffic. The Adriatic Sea seems so small on computer screens and satellite images, similar to an appendix. The Google Earth program provides an overview and gives the dimensions of each slope.

Today’s generations, accustomed to satellite images, should also be more responsible for space because they have complete insight into its limited ranges. However, these satellite images make it easier for speculators, real-estate agencies, and officials to sell state property: they can be used for a quick search for undeveloped hidden coves, such as the so-called Dalmatian islands. One Russian tycoon, one would say in an old-fashioned way (of course, a former high-ranking “comrade”, similar to Goldfinger), is trying to build new tourist complexes on Mljet, where the national park is located, on that island of mythical beauty. Neoliberalism frees the hands of international profiteers, many of whom want to seize entire islands with lighthouses. They intend to plunder the still untouched outer parts of the island. They will build roads with state funds under the pretext of fire prevention. Then, with the support of the home population, intensive construction will follow.

The local population, which long ago appropriated the former communal pastures, Church and other feudal properties, participates in selling even small islands. It advocates changes to urban plans so that green zones become building sites. Coasts and sea areas are given in concessions, like the inauguration, as a phenomenon of neofeudalism. In the Middle Ages, individual monasteries first claimed the rights to fishing areas. Speculators of all kinds and nationalities are particularly efficient in transit countries, and politicians, even ministers, and local people are at their service.

Everything is on sale

In countries in transition, the idea that urban planning is a remain of socialism that should be forgotten as soon as possible has already taken hold. Everything that is not forbidden is allowed. There is no longer talk of the common good, state and social ownership. The false hopes placed in the Church as a moral authority have also evaporated because it is too preoccupied with worldly concerns; for example, nuns, and Benedictines from the Monastery of St. Marije in Zadar, surrendered the land concession given to them by King Petar Krešimir.

People who live on the coast seem to have no choice but to sell off the land and hope for tourism’s benefits. A new “migration of the Slavs”, a process of littoralization, is underway, a mass immigration of the population from the neglected interior of the northwestern Balkan, a population hoping for a comfortable life on the coast.

The repercussions of an exclusive orientation to tourism are manifested in all spheres

General robbery of the coastal area and construction in every possible bay regins, the “first row to the sea” is desirable to make a living from renting apartments in the summer period. However, the economic monoculture does not indicate a “bright future”. It does not bode well, as was shown during the COVID-19 epidemic. The repercussions of the exclusive orientation towards tourism are manifested in all spheres, for example, in the demographic emptying of the hinterland, in the ideology of zimmer frei tourism, in false servile waiter mentality, with hotelkeepers who are ready to provide guests with an imaginative oral, gastro (anal) and genital pleasures, very similar to the character Thénardiers from the novel Les Misérables. The development of sex tourism is ahead.

You don’t need excellent mathematical knowledge and high education to keep statistics on the number of visits and overnight stays, to calculate the difference between the prices of drinks in wholesale and retail, how to hide the differences between fresh and frozen fish… One tourism expert, a self-proclaimed captain from Makarska, boasts: “I have to cheat, lie and steal. I have to be a snake in the grass!”(3). An advertisement can also indicate the intellectual range of the tourist entertainment “industry”: So don’t worry. This year it’s hot where you are. And you don’t give a Pipi.“ (4)

The left and the right participate in the illegal construction and appropriation of the Adriatic coast

Rocks are mined to concrete the coast in front of which it is embanked, “supplemented” with crushed stone for artificial beaches. Left and right, even “charismatic” persons participate in the illegal construction and appropriation of the coast (5).

Small islands are also occupied. Rugged construction is a three-dimensional projection of social practice, population mentality, and politics. Along the coast and on the islands, foreign citizens are building “wildly”, mainly from Slovenia, where foreigners cannot build, especially not without a permit. An outstanding political achievement of the political practice is the so-called legalization of rugged construction, the legalization of the illegal, in fact, recognition of spatial chaos (6).

100-naše-stop-nasipavanju

Unfortunately, the more remote Adriatic islands are covered with plastic waste

How many tons of garbage end up at the bottom of the Adriatic, increasingly turning into a landfill? In November 2001, the sea around Pelješac and Mljet was full of debris floating from Albania: plastic objects, hospital waste, needles, catheters, blood vessels, etc. Occasionally, even in the port of Dubrovnik, the cover of garbage darkens. The beaches of more remote islands are covered with waste, primarily plastic. On the beaches, you should be careful not to prick yourself with needles discarded by drug addicts.

There will be work for future hydro archaeologists. A few more amphorae, but also discarded computers, will be able to surface at the bottom. Unused missiles with depleted uranium, thrown into the sea after the bombing of Serbia, also languish in the mud at the bottom of the Adriatic. How much wastewater and polluted rivers are poured into the sea? Neither Krka nor Zrmanja was spared. When the Po River releases radioactive substances into the Adriatic, an oscillation of radioactivity follows on the opposite coast as well.

The Adriatic is the artery of world shipping traffic

On the Adriatic, it is becoming increasingly narrow. Look at the open sea from Ancona. You can see tankers strung together like caterpillars, transporting tons of oil and other various cargoes, including those dangerous to the environment, along the coast. Islands hide such  scenes on the eastern side of the Adriatic. The Adriatic is still an artery of world traffic, which is carried by huge merchant ships and military fleets, while submarines, some nuclear-powered, are hidden under the surface.

The bloodstream of oil flows through the Adriatic

During the observation in September 2008, there were an average of 75 ships in navigation in the Adriatic Sea, a maximum of 125Of that number, an average of 20% were tankers. Now that number is much higher. The blood of oil flows through the Adriatic – the black blood of modern civilization, of strategic interest in the game of world politics. According to the latest observations, 6,100 ships with dangerous cargo enter and leave the Adriatic during the year, of which 4,386 are tankers with 60.3 million tons of oil and oil derivatives (7).

The Družba Adria project was insisted upon, connecting the Adriatic pipeline (transportation of crude oil) with the Russian Družba, the world’s longest oil pipeline. Currently, liquefied gas is being stored on Krka. It is enough to spill oil from just one tanker to cover the surface of the entire Adriatic with a thin layer of oil. The total cumulative area of oil slicks on the Adriatic, due to spills from ships, is 1228 km2, three times more than the area of Cres – the largest Adriatic island. These are not spills due to the consequences of maritime accidents, but due to non-compliance with regulations (8).

Under these oily soups, the sea cannot breathe and phytoplankton suffocates. Over the cliffs of the outer islands stretch long, black strips, traces of mineral oils. On some beaches, the gravel is sticky due to fuel oil drifts. During the helicopter flight to Palagruža, I was shown everywhere the sight of sea surfaces with greasy spots of iridescent colors and floating piles of garbage.

On April 2, 2014, the Government of the Republic of Croatia opened a public tender for exploring and exploiting oil and gas in the Croatian part of the Adriatic Sea. Blasting on the seabed was used in the research of possible sites. Exploratory oil drilling in the Montenegrin Sea begins with the concessionaire Italian-Russian company “Eni and Novatek”. Gas has been exploited on the Italian part of the Adriatic Sea for a long time. A gas explosion on the Pagura platform (11 miles from the port of Ravenna) caused the platform’s sinking on the 29th of September 1965. The gas eruption stopped only three months later. Three technicians were killed.

Cruisers on the Adriatic

Tourism involves different types of pollution. Some cruise ships carry more than 4,000 passengers and more than 2,000 staff members, which is many times more than the population of most Dalmatian towns. In Dubrovnik, as planned, 441 cruise ships with 740,000 passengers are expected, who, crammed into a finally large ship, risk diseases, pneumonia for example. Until then, the population of the historic core of Dubrovnik was only a few hundred. Up to 180,000 tourists can visit Split in one day. A cruise ship with a capacity of three thousand guests transports several thousand tons of fuel in its tanks, produces daily 10.5 – 12 tons of solid waste, 1203 kg of carbon dioxide per one kilometer of navigation, 60,000 – 120,000 liters of black wastewater, 1,020,000 liters of gray wastewater, 30,000 liters of oily water, and even 390 – 480 kg of hazardous waste (9).

In addition to a little money, every tourist from the cruise ship also leaves a cubic decimeter of excrement and urine, which should be counted as tourist products. On July 20, 2019, about 15 cruise ships anchored at the Zlatni Rat, punt on Brač, released feces, so the sea turned brown. (10) Warnings are published almost every day that certain beaches are polluted with feces, not only those from cruise ships. Fecal pollution, as dark brown spots floating towards Brijuni National Park, is visible from satellites (11).

There is a tendency to turn the entire Adriatic into a large amusement park full of marinas

The tendency is to turn the entire Adriatic into one big amusement park full of marinas with accompanying “entertainment facilities” that will block the waters and destroy the last untouched bays. Around 180,000 boats and yachts in summer sail through “our” part of the Adriatic (12). Croatia is the world’s nautical charter superpower, owning 40 percent of the world’s charter fleet of boats and yachts. This fleet of nearly two and a half thousand such vessels is used annually by about half a million guests (13).

Marinas, in addition to bringing profit, are big polluters: wastewater produced during the washing of ships, paints for coating ships, water produced during engine washing and during the repair and washing of underwater surfaces, oily rainwater from manipulative asphalt surfaces, fecal, sanitary, bilge and ballast water, sanitary wastewater, mineral oils and from ships: small particles of polyester resins when working on plastic parts of the vessel, biocides that are components of anti-fouling paints, during the vessel’s stay in the marina (14).

A harbor for megayachts, for the largest ones in the world – Porto Montenegro Marina was built in Tivat on the site of a military shipyard; a similar fate probably awaits other Croatian shipyards. For example, the Trogir shipyard has been left to decay due to the planned construction of a hotel next to the marina, which has already congested the water area around Trogir.

The devastation of the natural values and cultural assets of the Adriatic occurs

Neither exceptional natural value nor cultural assets were spared from the devastation, not even formally protected ones, such as the salty Rogoznica Lake (Dragon Lake), a unique hydro geomorphological phenomenon. The lake is biochemically very sensitive: in 1997, scientists claimed that 20 thousand tons of living organisms died in the lake. In 1991, an influential entrepreneur around the lake initiated the construction of tourist complexes by Zmajevo Lake and a marina above the Zmajevo uho underwater cave, through which water circulated despite flag-based appeals. One of the first to instruct them was biologist Donat Petricioli (15).

In the bay of Vruja, on the slopes at the approach to Makarska Krajina, in one of the boundaries of the Dalmatian landscape, a tourist complex is being built without any necessary permits (16).

Due to the general lack of ownership and modern technology, it is possible to build on the outer sides of the island in such a geomorphological environment that was inaccessible and hidden until yesterday. Moorings, like the huge tentacles of some primitive animals, surround Biograd. Marinas also enter the Krka River, obscuring the panorama of picturesque Skradin.

Investors are “left” and “right” tycoons. Next is the celebrated Vela Luka, a tycoon building supported by the “left” side of the political spectrum. Of course, the “patriots” are in the lead.

The construction of most of the marinas, even the huge ones, such as the one near Seget, at the entrance to the Trogir channel, right next to the cemetery, similar to barbecues at sea, was started without prior permits, which were withdrawn over time. And they are our benefactors. They open opportunities for cheap labor, primarily for trained waiters and cooks, not only for locals but also those from further, even poorer countries. They are skilled players in a globalized world. Their imagination goes beyond narrow national boundaries: they build villas with swimming pools right by the sea, like in Florida. Their ideal is distant exotic islands where they swim and launder money.

For the former mayor of Split, the ideal is Split as Ibiza, a city on the eastern Balearic island, an example of an area congested with overcapacity tourist construction. Even more magical is Dubai, with its ostentatious luxury, a favorite tourist destination for people from the criminal business milieu.

“Patriots” do not shy away from selling their shares in hotel ownership to Arab investors. The project of a hostel complex of mammoth dimensions with the prophetic name Croatian dream (such dreams are already coming true) is offered for various locations in southern Dalmatia. However, it does not consider the region’s natural specificities or the micro-locations of chamber ranges, which are more suitable for endless beaches along coral reefs (17). The newspaper headline “Saudi Prince viewed the Croatian Dream project from a helicopter” sounds like a fairy tale coming true. (18)

For tourism and building speculation, the devastation of the biocenosis of the Adriatic is unimportant.

More and more aggressive advertisements on Google point to still untouched bays where cliffs will be mined and shores concreted, as well as sensitive contact zones and the “mouth of the sea” as T. S. Eliot prays. For tourism and building speculation, the devastation of biocenosis is unimportant; it doesn’t matter that on the shores, crabs squirm, shells cling, birds nest, grebes emerge, kingfishers fly, that the last flocks of wild ducks start there. Maybe some turtles still lay eggs on the shells; fur seals (locally called sea man), mammals, our close relatives, are already mostly exterminated.

Minister of Tourism Darko Lorencin presented the National Program for the Management and Arrangement of Sea Beaches, an action plan based on the Tourism Development Strategy until 2020, which aims to develop the “sun and sea” product. Based on this, a division was made into eco-beaches, beaches for surfers, diving, adrenaline, romantic beaches, beaches for dogs, beaches for families with children, party beaches, culture beaches, nudist beaches, urban promenade beaches, beaches with entertainment for young people, beaches with sports and recreational facilities, and resort or hotel beaches. (19)

Too many intensive activities are mutually exclusive – negative externalities, traffic, platforms for gas exploitation, fishing and promiscuity of all kinds, which endangers life in the sea. Ballast water from unloaded ships spills into the Adriatic, captured in some other distant and warm seas, causing ecological disturbances; harmful alga (Caulerpa taxifolia) originating from tropical seas spread across the bottom of the Adriatic. Unusual, rare specimens of invasive fish that arrived from distant warm seas are caught. New underwater intruders: with the ballast water, ribfish, macroplankton and a predator called the sea walnut (Mnemiopsis leidyi) also came in.

In the Mediterranean, there are fewer and fewer sardines – important links in the food chain; they are getting smaller, with a shorter life span, among other things, due to hunting for the needs of fish farms, which are polluters of their kind. Caged fish are allegedly given antibiotics and fed imported herring containing dioxin. And “our man” can’t stop himself from sometimes throwing explosives or blinding octopuses with a blue flag. It is not easy to stick to the prescribed fishing ban periods; even young fish are caught, and the fisherman “weaves his net” with increasingly narrow shafts. There are fewer and fewer fish. They are more and more expensive; we wonder with anxiety – how much mercury and microplastics are in them. Shellfish are dying out en masse, especially periwinkles (shells). We forget that people are also bound by food chains, and all possible connections with the entire living world, from plankton to fish.

The Adriatic still has its borders

Even if it were as big as the ocean, it wouldn’t be big enough to accommodate all the intense activities. But even in increasingly acidic oceans, archipelagos of plastic and other impurities float. Everything in the Adriatic and along the coasts: oil and gas extraction platforms, liquefied gas storages, oil refineries, yachts, fish and shellfish farms, fishing, tourism, maritime transport, hotels, kilometers of new barriers, crushed rocks and moorings. Thermal power plants along the coast were also “considered”. At one time, a nuclear plant was planned on Cape Ploče (Punta Planke).

Environmentalists fear that the Mediterranean will soon turn into a dead sea. (20) Such a fate will overtake its northern, narrow arm – the Adriatic.

The author of the text is Prof. Dr. Ivo Babić, a Croatian art historian and archaeologist (Trogir, June 17, 1946). In addition to topics from archeology and art history, he mainly researches the cultural heritage of Trogir and Split, emphasizing its protection.

1 Mirko TOMASOVIĆ, „Montaigne o hrvatskim hodočasnicama u Loretu i trgovcima u Anconi“, Mogućnosti, god. XLI, br. 4 – 6, Split, 1994., str. l20.
2 podatci prema Allianz-Safety & Shipping
3 „Dalmacija, legenda i gotovo, Ovaj brod već je 20 godina atrakcija kakve nema u Dalmaciji, a kapetan nam otkriva tajnu uspjeha: Moram varati, lagati i krasti, moram biti primazan svim mastima!“, Slobodna Dalmacija, 3. rujna 2018
4 Radio Ultra članak “Ovog ljeta cijela Hrvatska postaje plaža
5 Usp. „Čudo u Sućurju, Ovo je vila vidjelice iz Međugorja pred kojom je betonirana plaža, a za koju ona kaže ‘kakva kuća, koja plaža?’ Sedam dana luksuza naplaćuje 25.000 kn“, Jutarnji list, 31. srpnja 2019.
6 Članak na “Poslovni dnevnik”: Usp. MrakTARITAŠ: Legalizacijaodličnonapreduje
7 Podatci prema ADRIREP 2019/2020 i EUROSTAT 2018
8 Davor Vidas, „O zaštiti osobito osjetljivih morskih područja i potrebi regionalne suradnje u Jadranskom moru“
9 Jutarnji: Koliko, zapravo, hrvatska zarađuje na kruzerima? Nažalost, država ne vodi statistiku.; također Livia ŠANTIĆ, Siniša VILKE, Neven GRUBIŠIĆ, „Čimbenici štetnog djelovanja cruising-turizma na brodski okoliš“, Naše more: znanstveni časopis za more i pomorstvo, Vol. 58 No. 5 – 6, 2011., str. 241
10 „Nitko ne reagira. Kruzeri usidreni kod najljepše hrvatske plaže rade gadarije od kojih će vam se smučiti ‘meni je samo ostalo da promatram i analiziram boju i oblik…“, Jutarnji list, 22. srpnja 2019.
11 Index: Nenad JARIĆ DAUENHAUER, „Govna u Jadranu vide se iz svemira. Istražili smo odakle su došla“
12 Prema Izviješću Ministarstva mora, prometa i infrastrukture – 2019.
13 Jutarnji: Cloaca maxima, ,Pretvara li se Jadran u ogromnu septičku jamu direktor marine Pomer: ‘znate li koliko nam je jahtaša ovog ljeta došlo sa zahtjevom za pražnjenje?
14 K. DOGAN, T. MRŠIĆ, „Očuvanje prirodnih resursa nautičkog turizma u Republici Hrvatskoj“, Pomorski zbornik, 47 – 48 (2013.), str. 81.
15 Irena CIGLENEČKI, Božena ĆOSOVIĆ, Damir VILIČIĆ, „Rogozničko jezero (Zmajevo oko) – koliko osjetljiv ekosistem? „Hrvatska vodoprivreda, (1330-321X) 67 (1998), 4, 43–47; Slobodna Dalmacija: Vedrana STOČIĆ, „Rogozničko jezero Zmajevo oko ponovno se zamutilo: Smrad po trulim jajima nesnošljiv je“
16 Index: Unatoč brojim pregnantnim tekstovima književnika Borisa Dežulovića i građanskim protestnim akcijama, investitor je ignorirao javnost, pozivajući se na veze s najvećim državnim dužnosnicima. V. npr. Dežulović odgovara: Milanović je Superhik, otima zemlju narodu i daje ju tajkunima; Večernji list: Tko je Latkoviću dao da devastira Vruju? Josipović: Kako bi bilo tko štitio čovjeka bez građevinske?
17 Portal oko članak: “Hrvatski san ide dalje župan mijenja prostorni plan ide golf”
18 Večernji list: Želi ulagati. Saudijski princ iz helikoptera razgledao projekt Hrvatski san
19 Šibensko kninska županija članak: Ministar Lorencin u vodicama predstavio nacionalni program upravljanja i uređenja morskih plaža
20 YouTube

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