DRUM HEAD: Rachel Langley says she’s running out of avenues and she doesn’t know what else to do, in her efforts in trying to save a 100-year-old ship boiler in the waters off Drum Head.
She indicated the only remnants of a vessel that caught fire and was hauled offshore to sink that damaged cargo worth $75,000 at the time, is scheduled for removal later this summer.
“I guess to a normal person it’s just a rusty boiler that’s stuck in the middle of the water, not that it’s in the middle of the water, it’s in a cove on the island,” Langley told The Reporter. “It’s a rusty boiler out of a shipwreck that’s been there since 1921.”
She explained there’s history behind the rusting boiler, as it’s something everybody in the community has grew up with, noting it’s almost become a local landmark.
As a result, Langley created the Facebook group called “Save the Drum Head Boiler” and established an online petition that has now garnered over 340 signatures.
“It kind of just goes with the scenery at this point,” Langley said. “You go to the island, you go to the boiler.”
Sticking out of the water about three metres at low tide, the boiler is located in a small inlet off Harbour Island and she said locals will dive off it and swim around it, noting the boiler’s significance is still strong within the community today.
“I know down the road, there’s a family with about five generations, and the young fella I was just talking to him the other day, he has just a little one and he can’t wait to take him,” Langley said. “Because his father took him and his father took him. It’s almost like a family tradition for a lot of people.”
The boiler is from the 42-metre, steam-powered Scotia and is on a list of 14 abandoned vessels and related infrastructure that the Province of Nova Scotia has promised to clean up, after receiving funding through Transport Canada’s Abandoned Boats Program.
Langley explained there’s not one person in the community of 36 that doesn’t want the boiler to stay, which is why it’s been frustrating since she can’t find where the complaint came from.
“We heard about it on the radio, so I called the Department of Transportation because they were the ones giving out the grants for the abandoned boats program,” she said. “I called them and tried to find out who had the grant and why.”
She was directed to Nova Scotia Lands Inc., a company based out of Sydney.
According to their Web site, they are the go to agency for environmental clean-up, asset management, information and land management in the province.
“I eventually got a hold of James Webster, who is the construction project manager when he called me, they say a complaint was put in about the boiler and that’s how they were notified,” Langley said. “I asked where the complaint came from and he told me the Department of Lands and Forestry, which sounded funny, because it’s in the middle of the ocean.”
Continuing to follow the trail, she contacted the provincial Lands and Forestry office in Halifax, who sent her to Antigonish, and then to Guysborough, without anyone able to find the source of the complaint.
“I couldn’t trace it back, I couldn’t find the complaint,” Langley said. “Nobody wants to take responsibility.”
In her conversation with Webster, he proceeded to tell her they weren’t allowed to move the boiler until the end of August, which made the career fisher think there must be some reason they’re not allowed to touch it until then.
“Right next to the cove, there’s several protected areas for birds, on the island that’s just adjacent to this island, actually the entire island is not touchable because of the bird Roseate Tern,” Langley said. “So I think that was one thing he slipped up on.”
Before Nova Scotia Lands could move the boiler, she explained Webster told her they were required to complete a marine survey, which concluded there was no marine life established at the bottom of the boiler.
“Because according to his survey, it comes completely out of water at low-tide. I live right in front of it, and it has never ever, ever come fully out of water,” Langley said. “It’s been going on 100-years, there’s marine life going on at the bottom of that boiler, nobody can tell me otherwise.”
With little remaining possibilities in saving the boiler, she reached out to her local representation in Guysborough-Tracadie MLA Lloyd Hines and Cape Breton-Canso MP Mike Kelloway.
Working back and forth with Kelloway, the only conclusion the pair could come up with was applying for a grant to get a marine archeologist to designate it a historic shipwreck.
“But as a little person, who doesn’t have connections how would I do that,” Langley said. “He tried to help, but it just doesn’t seem practical, for me to do by myself at least.”
She never heard from Hines.
Finally, her local councillor Rickey McLaren contacted her asking what was going on with the boiler as Hines called him explaining it was a federal matter and there was nothing he could do.
“I was like ‘really, you know nothing, I got a Facebook page, I have a petition, it’s all over the radio, and you don’t know anything,’” Langley said. “Maybe I’ve raised enough stink, shall we say for the lack of better terms, that maybe somebody’s going to pay attention at this point.”
Not only will they be removing a piece of the community’s history, she said they’re going to ruin the ocean floor and they’re going to destroy marine life, all for a couple bucks.
“It’s just a money grab as far as I’m concerned and I really don’t like it. I would almost bet my savings that that complaint didn’t come from anyone in this community,” Langley said. “I’m starting to run out of avenues, I could try to contact someone from the environment, but I don’t know what else to do.”