Booze, food, fuel, running low.
Ramifications from the world’s response to coronavirus are far reaching. Yet to be fully understood.
Border closures. Enforced quarantines. Essential social services in many countries suspended. Macro decisions that hit on a micro level.
The biggest social upheaval since World War II plays out in myriad ways.
As I write, twelve surfers from Newcastle, Australia, are in limbo off the coast of Sumba, east of Bali. Stranded by a political decision that sees them unable to disembark from their boat nor allowed to return home.
While they were out chasing waves in a mobile reception dead zone, local government authorities decreed no foreigners could set foot on land in any of their ports for fear of spreading the mildly lethal virus further.
Upon their return, they found the world had shut up shop.
No back to life, no back to reality.
At one stage, the dozen were down to the final meal and running dangerously low on basic supplies. The skipper they’d use the last of their fuel to travel to nearby Flores, but there was no guarantee they could land there either.
Many have already missed connecting flights home (and will now face a two-week quarantine for their troubles when they do finally make it).
“We’ve had one boat come out to speak to us to basically tell us we can’t come to land,” one of the surfers, Brydon Roper, told 9News.“This is a ten-day surf charter so the guys that run this boat stocked it for ten days only of food and water.”
Dire times east of the Wallace line.
Yet surf travel companies in my Facebook feed are still advertising business as usual in the Ments, up the other end of the archipelago. Freedom of passage assured, lack of crowds guaranteed. Social distancing to be enforced on the trip, allegedly. But any person that’s ever stepped foot on one of those testosterone-soaked love boats knows how that will play out
Cheap deals for you, mister.
Special price for today only. Shred the apocalypse.
But the situation is evolving as quickly as the virus spreads.
The only knowns are the unknowns and a real-world, geopolitical unravelling that would rival any right-wing-left-wing conspiracy fantasy.
So what would you do for love in the time of coronavirus?
Risk a dirt-cheap trip and uncrowded perfection for the chance of quarantine, forced berthing, or worse?
It’s a yeah, nah, for me.
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Nup
This is China’s push to global superstardom
Still devoted to the deceitful clown I see…. have you adopted a comb over and orange makeup?
On a serious note, my annual trips got smashed and the toilet we call a beach needs a flush at least the ocean would be moving.
Yeah, but did they SCORE?!
If Putin gives him permission
There was a cohort of 14 skiers from the LA basin that ALL became infected on an Italian ski trip. 3 of them are on ventilators as we speak. Fit men aged 40-50. One is in an induced coma. The “only grandma will die” meme is bullshit.
Where there’s a sea, there’s surf.
And where there’s surf, there’s VALs.
An where there’s VALs, there’s….
a ripe market for Hurluley!!!
YAY!!!
I agree with you on that
Nope. Let’s see in a month who was right.
Do you see that your hypothesis that there is little need to act is not scientific? It is unfalsifiable in the practical sense. We “alarmists” are proposing that the way to avoid a high body count is to overreact. If we clamp down on social interaction and the body count is low, it will be claimed by the blasé that the action was unnecessary. But the thing we are proposing is that NO ACTION will kill more people. If the body count is low in one month after we take measures, that proves we were right, not that the steps were unnecessary.
The only way to “prove” you are right is business as usual and that will not happen.
Most people who have get it have none to mild symptoms, never knowing they had Covid 19. Two weeks ago I had a flu and assumed it wasn’t Covid 19 because I had no cough. But then reading what Tom Hanks had for symptoms realized mine were exactly the same. I might have had it! Millions of people could tell a similar story I think.
Whatevs – people have to die of something. Is that news? In 2017 there were 2.8 million deaths in the US. 650,000 of heart disease, 600,000 of cancer, etc etc. Since those most at risk are the elderly and the infirm, isn’t It pretty likely that those folks would be dying of something else sooner rather than later? I’m sorry, was that not something that can be said in polite society?
Bingo!
What’s your source Dr smarty pants?
Mine says its media bullshit
Told me on saturday.
Same. Two Docs I’ve heard from say it’s media hype.
Your Doctor is a moron. Maybe time to find a more well-read medico?
At least he’s alive.
JOB wins wave of the not summer!!
Hope for all fat cunts
is Booze, Food, Fuel some sort of hierarchy? Sorry, that’s Rhetorical obvs, but seriously folks, I hope everyone is ok, and that Chas gets his kid home safe
This is the worry. I have spoken to two doctor friends who are not overly cautious, and they think the virus is a serious problem. If you do the math – # dead/# cases – the mortality rate has been steady at 3.5-4%.
The other day Nickelarse Carrot said he’s off on the trip of a lifetime to surf like it’s 1989, looks like Indo by boat is out…
I was a hypochondriac long before this flu. My wife began lecturing me on social distancing on our walk this morning… “Honey, I’ve been practicing social distancing for 40 years”
Social distancing is old hat to misanthropes like me. Would be a lot harder without internet and Netflix for sure, so I’m thankful for that. And the ability to walk the beach which here is nearly deserted normally at this time of year.
I’ve never been a germophobe. I never even bother with flu shots. Back in the day I did invasive procedures (interventional neuroradiology, etc.) on patients who had HIV before there was any therapy and no one knew that much about how it spread. An errant needle stick during a bloody procedure could kill you.
I’ve been a physician for over 30 years and this looks serious to me. 2-3 x as contagious as flu. 10x as deadly if you get it. That’s the Cliff’s notes version.
The only thing that will limit death is to overreact. The death toll will be inverse to how much we temporarily crash the economy and bore ourselves to death. It’s that simple
I’ve been looking at all these books in our house and realized I haven’t read too many so I”m gonna immerse myself in yoga education. I doubt the wife will look at the surfing collection and come to the same conclusion.
As for HIV… my family owned a store in the epicenter of the outbreak. The panic was similar to what we see now except isolated to our gay staff. This one french dude came down with it and died in days… not kidding. The store went into a full panic, we did not realize that Camille had sex with most of our staff. One by one the dropped.
We lost a dozen of 16 full time employees within a month. Two jumped, I think three went of ‘vacations” after spending sprees and lavish gifts bestowed to others and never returned.
The streets of West Hollywood erupted into gay bedlam. Protests, attacking cars, pretty crazy.
Rents in the neighborhood were high and there was no occupancy. By the end of that year, we couldn’t fill our apartment buildings.
Thing was, none of the straight people took it seriously and viewed the whole thing as “gods will”…. so pathetic. Humans have a ways to go and now there are too many of us.
30%? GTFO. I mean, seriously.
suddenly… in my home with disregulated 10 year old boys beating each other up and the prospect of weeks and weeks in the Jersey Shore suburbs doesn’t look so bad… maybe an uncrowded surf session in a 5-mil is in the works too… who knew New Jersey was the place to be after reading this nightmare? best hopes and prayers for this group on this boat…
I was in Jakarta two years ago for an earthquake and the first thing that popped into my head was “fuck…I’m going to be stuck here.”
Not really the place you want to be in these types of situations.
Next time you want to go somewhere for an earthquake try NZ
It always seems like the really nice places are prone to shaking or hurricaning.