Spain shoots at jet skiers.... ?

[VO5]

What on earth has that got to do with the matter in hand?

Perhaps he has a point though. It's beginning to look, from what I've seen on this thread so far that there are elements within Gib who are absolutely determined to paint the Spanish in a bad light. A bit more objectivity and a little less willingness to take unsubstantiated rumour as being fact is called for.

It is not sufficient for you to get a perspective on this ?

From his website again:~

...Our winter home for 2012 - 2013 close enough to Gibraltar to walk but we do like the Spanish side....

I get the drift your slant is not dissimilar, or, you are bored rigid and enjoy stirring....

You ought to get out more, you really ought to...

 

[VO5]

Gents,
The fact is when on a Jet ski you go around fast, do donuts and mess around. That is what a Jet ski is for. The Area he was messing around in was British Gibraltar Waters. In this area he is allowed to mess around. The fact that there was a Guardia Civil Boat there was an irrelevance to him. He was messing about in a Jet ski in a place it was registered (Is G registered) in a place he was allowed. He was not annoying the Guardia Civil, just having fun. The Guardia Civil Boat was clearly in British Gibraltar waters and was wrong to be there. The fact they discharged weapons is out of order.
The individual and his family are quite wealthy (hence the new Jet Ski) and would not be smuggling Cigarettes. The Jet ski had Gib registration numbers on the Bow so was clearly a Gib Jet ski. There is smuggling but by Spanish Nationals on Spanish Boats. I have a Speedboat here in Gib and if I go and play anywhere near la Linea I sometimes get a visit from the RGP or a Patrol boat asking what I am up to. As I am innocent I have no issue. if in Spanish waters I have no problem if the Guardia Civil stop me. However I have been in Gib waters when a Guardia Vessel comes near and I ignore it......and just carry on. If I ignored it and he started shooting it would not be very good.
Yes there are mitigating issues like smuggling but there are also protocols where the GC call the RGP (who had a man on the beach) and the RGP would investigate (and do). This was and is outrageous. You cannot defend the GC for this. Can you imagine if this happened in the Falklands…….
N

+1.

 

[SamanthaTabs]

Nautorius, I actually applauded reading that despite the fact I hate jet skis (well when they're using our boat as a racer mark..)

If you're an OVHC chap, say a big hi from me. Amazing people (off track, apologies)!

 

[Nostrodamus]

It is not sufficient for you to get a perspective on this ?

From his website again:~

...Our winter home for 2012 - 2013 close enough to Gibraltar to walk but we do like the Spanish side....

I get the drift your slant is not dissimilar, or, you are bored rigid and enjoy stirring....

You ought to get out more, you really ought to...

VO5,
You obviously feel strongly and if I was a Gibraltarian I may feel the same. I put this post up to bring the Gibraltar problem to peoples attention same as I did when the warship recently paraded itself in Gibraltar waters with the big ensign.
On my website I gave my opinion of what we found in our stay over winter. We did find the Spanish people very friendly and very helpful, more so than people in Gibraltar.
That is my opinion. The locals in La Linea seem to be quiet happy with Gibraltar being British as it give them employment. The last Mayor of La Linea apparently stole a lot of the towns money as has happened in several places in Spain.
There was a lot we saw happening there and it was not all by the Spanish.
If you want to have a go at me over my personal opinion please do so ..after all I started this.
As I said you have strong opinions of your own but I also respect them even if I don't agree with some things you have said.

 

[VO5]

VO5,
You obviously feel strongly and if I was a Gibraltarian I may feel the same. I put this post up to bring the Gibraltar problem to peoples attention same as I did when the warship recently paraded itself in Gibraltar waters with the big ensign.
On my website I gave my opinion of what we found in our stay over winter. We did find the Spanish people very friendly and very helpful, more so than people in Gibraltar.
That is my opinion. The locals in La Linea seem to be quiet happy with Gibraltar being British as it give them employment. The last Mayor of La Linea apparently stole a lot of the towns money as has happened in several places in Spain.
There was a lot we saw happening there and it was not all by the Spanish.
If you want to have a go at me over my personal opinion please do so ..after all I started this.
As I said you have strong opinions of your own but I also respect them even if I don't agree with some things you have said.

Yes, of course it is your prerogative.

But now you are going to have a lot of fun, crossing the frontier as you say you do.

I will not go there.

I will not be irradiated at the whim of the Spanish Authorities.

From today's local paper, read it, and to anyone who understands the effect of repeated and indiscriminate use of radiation, it will send a shiver down their spine.


Spanish Customs to use full-body see-through scanner at frontier


By Leo Olivero
PANORAMA NEWSDESK: The Spanish Government are to deploy a ‘Mobile X-Ray Scanner’ at the frontier to detect, according to them, cross-frontier smuggling of tobacco.

In a Panorama Investigation we can exclusively reveal the mobile X-ray scan technology mentioned is one installed and operated in a mobile vehicle (van) - it is system that is potentially dangerous!

Serious concerns start to emerge when specifications and the potential of the vehicles equipment are examined. This important information has been kept firmly under-wraps by the Spanish Authorities. however our investigation has been able to discover, unwrap and expose another dirty gamí:e by Spain against the people of Gibraltar. One that may have human rights implications, as the use of such intrusive equipment at a frontier not only raises important privacy issues but also matters of health!

To give a brief description of the equipment, spanish customs intend to use at the frontier: this is an apparatus with known hi-tech capabilities, it’s scanning device aims a focussed X-ray beam that reportedly has the ‘capability of penetrating 14 inches of steel and capturing detailed parts of the human body as vehicles and people pass across equipment’s (dangerous) beams’ this is a process that is simultaneously monitored by operators inside the van.

Shocking Revelation

This is quite a shocking revelation. These plans are said to be part of a strategy to crack-down on cigarette smuggling across the frontier, which they say is causing untoward damage to the Spanish economy

The regional special representative of ‘La Agencia Tributaria’ (Spanish Tax) Alberto García Valera, says he has found it necessary to spend money and invest heavily on new technologies to combat fraud and tax evasion in places like the Le Linea-Gibraltar Frontier.

He is a high ranking customs officer and a national Inspector for Hacienda . He said the state will be installing what he describes as ‘video –surveillance’ which he sparsely described as van with the capability to scan in 30 seconds the presence of tobacco products in any part of a Vehicle or on the Body of a Person”

Valera added that the mobile scan equipment is specifically built to detect tobacco products only; he added that for every euro invested by his organisation a 400% return is expected with the use of this equipment. He also says the frontier will also see an improved system to monitor i/d cards which would speed up frontier crossings, particularly for cross-frontier Spanish (only) workers it seems.

As Expected Gibraltar Gets The Customary Verbal Assault

As you would expect the obvious and awaited anti-Gibraltar jibe didn’t take long to come this when Valera said “its jurisdictions like Gibraltar who sell tobacco at half the price who create these incentives for people to smuggle them over the frontier”

There was something obviously not right with what was said, the details were sketchy, unconvincing and if Gibraltar is blamed in anyway then you know these scheming conniving Spaniards are up to something…Which Was The Sign For Panorama to Investigate Further.

We conducted our own investigation, it took us a long afternoon and early evenings work to discover that the ‘La Agencia Tributaria’ placed an order with the American company American Science and Engineering (AS&E) for the delivery of this very sophisticated and hi-tech scan system known as the ZBV S-Class to be used for Frontier deployment.

The makers of the ZBV System are a USA company ‘American Science and Engineering’ are said to be one of the leading worldwide suppliers of X-ray detection equipment.

The ZBV or Z Backscatter Van, according the makers is a mobile X-ray vehicle screening system, it uses technology known as ‘Backscatter’ which provides a photo-like images of concealed objects, such as explosives, drugs, currency trade-fraud items and of course things like cigarettes, but the latter not exclusively so.

The ZBV X-Ray Scanning equipment is integrated into a standard van type vehicle, usually powered by a Mercedes or Chrysler engine. According to the makers AS&E the ZBV creates a photo-like Z Backscatter images showing materials by directing a sweeping beam of X-rays at the object under examination, and then measuring and plotting the intensity of scattered X-rays…if you’re in your car, your body will get zapped by the X-Ray beams!

Another significant feature to this equipment is that these vans can scan adjacent vehicles while the system (the ZBV) itself is moving, scanning an entire row of parked cars in a single pass-through and producing clear images. They can also be operated in stationary mode by parking the van, and producing X-ray images of vehicles and people inside as they pass by.

Privacy and Health Concerns Elsewhere!

Other technological abilities include near-photo quality that views through clothes.

As you would expect there have been serious health and privacy concerns raised in the USA and elsewhere particularly where these units are in operation.

The ZBV system was introduced in 2003 each unit cost in the region of $750, 000.

A Powerful Scanning Equipment Not Suited In An Enclosed & Restricted Frontier

If you take our own scenario which is a very enclosed and busy frontier with its unique geographical setup, a situation which I believe is not conducive (health wise) for the introduction of such hi-tech and potentially potent piece of scanning equipment.

With 40,000 people crossing the frontier everyday, the same people, and children included, making the regular frontier crossing dozens of times a week. Now exposed to the whims of people who literally hate us… who will be hidden in a van and would zap us with x-ray beams whenever they felt like it, something we would never know!

Where are the guarantees from the Spanish Government that this new Brain Wave to generate money will not be a health hazard to the many thousands of people who cross the frontier regularly - who live and work on either side of the frontier?

Are we to believe Mr Valera who said the new equipment is only there to catch tobacco smugglers, yet in the same breath says the X-ray scans the entire body looking for the odd packet of cigarette someone may have stashed down someone’s knickers or in another’s underpants.

Are we to trust that the Spanish customs operators of the unit will keep to strict operating procedures and not use the machine to scan everyone that crosses the frontier…suspect smugglers or not! Are we also to believe this mobile scanning unit will not drive along the frontier fence and scan local vehicles on this side of the frontier even before they drive across or are even going about their business on British territory.

How can we believe these people when they daily invade our waters break our laws and take shots at innocent civilians in BGTW and then openly deny everything - OF COURSE WE CAN’T!

In theory, experts say that the device is supposed to be safe for human targets, this if it’s operated at a distance, because the beam is weakened by penetrating the metal of a vehicle before it reaches a person, the frontier does not allow for any kind of a safe distance.

Professor Peter Rez, a physicist at Arizona State University who specializes in X-ray technology, and who has been doing research on backscatter X-ray dosages, says that if used properly, the radiation doses received by targeted persons would be very small, but then he notes that if the government (in the USA) begins a major campaign of stealthy X-raying on roads and at locations there are concerns. If you receive 15 doses a month is that SAFE?

Another scan expert also quoted that radiation from “one scan is the equivalent to flying for 15 minutes at 30,000 feet in an aircraft”, so if you cross the frontier 30 times a month and get zapped ten times only – this would be the equivalent of flying 90 minutes at 3000,000 feet - sounds dangerous to me! And not because I don’t like flying!

I believe this is an important issue that should be officially investigated and many questions asked by the UK and Local Government to the Spanish Government. Probably also suggesting to them to send a fleet of these mobile scan vehicles and station them outside the Spanish Parliament and start zapping Spanish ministers and others as they walk in and out of La Moncloa…I have no doubt this would be much more profitable

01-07-13






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[Rigger Mortice]

It is not sufficient for you to get a perspective on this ?

From his website again:~

...Our winter home for 2012 - 2013 close enough to Gibraltar to walk but we do like the Spanish side....

I get the drift your slant is not dissimilar, or, you are bored rigid and enjoy stirring....

You ought to get out more, you really ought to...

The perspective I'm getting on this is very clear, and it's not Nostrodamus who is getting his knickers in a twist.
As I said before; perhaps you should wait until the full story and proper evidence becomes available. If it ever does.

 

[Seatrout]

its probably time we handed back sovereignty of Gibraltar back to the Spanish, just like we did with Hong Kong and the Chinese.
It could be argued that we have no right whatsoever to be there in the first place.

 

[VO5]

The perspective I'm getting on this is very clear, and it's not Nostrodamus who is getting his knickers in a twist.
As I said before; perhaps you should wait until the full story and proper evidence becomes available. If it ever does.

No, it has been explained to you several times, and in great detail I might add.
Yet, insofar as you are concerned any amount of explanation is not sufficient.
So how many more times do you have to be told. how many ?

 

[VO5]

its probably time we handed back sovereignty of Gibraltar back to the Spanish, just like we did with Hong Kong and the Chinese.
It could be argued that we have no right whatsoever to be there in the first place.

Don't be foolish.

Gibraltar was ceded to Great Britain in 1713 in exchange for Minorca (Leghorn) under the Treaty of Utrecht.
And this treaty specifies it was ceded to Great Britain in perpetuity, and not a lease like Hong Kong.

But you are obviously new to this discussion and have not done your homework properly.

Spain has, since 1717, persisted in rendering their side of the bargain invalid by first signing an agreement, and then breaking it by laying siege to the subject of the agreement, not once, but 13 times !

Therefore, a nation with this track record cannot be trusted, ever.

Anything they promise, agree to or commit to or sign by way of treaty is not worth the paper it is written on.

It is that simple.

 

[Seatrout]

Don't be foolish.

Gibraltar was ceded to Great Britain in 1713 in exchange for Minorca (Leghorn) under the Treaty of Utrecht.

Anything they (Spain) promise, agree to or commit to or sign by way of treaty is not worth the paper it is written on.

It is that simple.

Hence it should be handed back to them and be done with all this pocket imperialism.

 

[VO5]

Hence it should be handed back to them and be done with all this pocket imperialism.

Handed back to them by whom, and under what authority ?
We have moved on.
We have a constitution.
And because this is a democracy and not a totalitarian system, the wishes of the Gibraltarians have to be respected.
And our wishes are to remain British and the question of change of sovereignity is not negotiable.
Just like the Falklands.
Simple.

 

[Seatrout]

Handed back to them by whom, and under what authority ?

Under your suggestion of the notion that the original treaty isn't worth the paper its written on?

 

[VO5]

Under your suggestion of the notion that the original treaty isn't worth the paper its written on?

Because they have broken it 13 times. They have broken it. Therefore they have lost the right to claim it back.

 

[chinita]

VO5,

Regarding your irradiation statement.

Can you explain why this is dangerous to Gibraltarians?

I thought it was to combat cigarette smuggling by the Spanish who transit the border many times a week to collect cheap tobacco products.

Surely you should welcome it.

 

[SeamanStaines]

Because a very large number, probably the majority of workers in Gibraltar actually live in La Linea..... It is notable when you are there that it is not the Spanish living in La Linea who have an issue with the Gibraltarians, they rely on it for their income and La Linea would be a very insignificant place without it.

VO5,

Regarding your irradiation statement.

Can you explain why this is dangerous to Gibraltarians?

I thought it was to combat cigarette smuggling by the Spanish who transit the border many times a week to collect cheap tobacco products.

Surely you should welcome it.

 

[Rigger Mortice]

No, it has been explained to you several times, and in great detail I might add.
Yet, insofar as you are concerned any amount of explanation is not sufficient.
So how many more times do you have to be told. how many ?

You have not provided an explanation. You have simply repeated the same story many times.

We have seen no credible evidence that the local Spaniards really have confirmed that they fired rubber bullets. All we have seen is that some unknown person claimed they had been told that.

We've also got the word of the jet skier. In one report he claimed that he had been fired on, legged it, and was then fired at three more times. I'm still struggling to work out how a jet skier, who is making a run for it on his machine, can work out that he has been fired at three times.

You can tell me the same story 100 times, but it won't be any more convincing until you come up with credible evidence.

As I said before, it may have happened. It may not. But I wouldn't want to see GB falling out with Spain on the basis of what has been presented to date.

 

[VO5]

VO5,

Regarding your irradiation statement.

Can you explain why this is dangerous to Gibraltarians?

I thought it was to combat cigarette smuggling by the Spanish who transit the border many times a week to collect cheap tobacco products.

Surely you should welcome it.

It is dangerous for everybody.
The Spanish government does not care who it particularly maims and who it doesn't.
But I feel particularly sorry for those who have to cross the frontier daily for whatever reason.
Whereas we Gibraltarians have freedom of choice, but for the Spanish people who cross every day whether to gratefully find work here or to scrape a meagre subsistence by smuggling some tobacco or alcohol or lighters or clothes pegs there is no choice. They will be the victims of their own government's conduct.
This is similar to the refinery affair....
The refinery was built in the Franco era with the intent of doing harm to our environment in Gibraltar, as a reprisal.
But it has backfired. This is because the prevailing winds blow the fumes back into Spain. At one stage there was a nuclear scare as therefinery was used to dispose of content containing nuclear waste. But over the years the incidence of lung diseases and cancers has risen dramatically in the region. The Spanish government stubbornly refuses to modify the refinery to make the smoke and ash pouring out of the chimneys safe. It would be easy. But they refuse. They are also deaf and blind to the harm they do to their own people. In Campamento, there are abandoned farms and houses dotted there considered uninhabitable. Even the fishermen who operated off the beach in Palmones have given up. So yes, I do welcome controls but not at the expense of health risks to everybody as the consequence of the imposition of draconian controls, as usual, by fiat, by decree.

 

[VO5]

You have not provided an explanation. You have simply repeated the same story many times.

We have seen no credible evidence that the local Spaniards really have confirmed that they fired rubber bullets. All we have seen is that some unknown person claimed they had been told that.

We've also got the word of the jet skier. In one report he claimed that he had been fired on, legged it, and was then fired at three more times. I'm still struggling to work out how a jet skier, who is making a run for it on his machine, can work out that he has been fired at three times.

You can tell me the same story 100 times, but it won't be any more convincing until you come up with credible evidence.

As I said before, it may have happened. It may not. But I wouldn't want to see GB falling out with Spain on the basis of what has been presented to date.

Listen, teapot, I am very patient, so I will explain it again, but my patience has its limits, you understand ?

All you have to do is watch the video...listen carefully...to the running commentary....and hear the distinctive crack of the rounds being fired....OK ?

Now if that doesn't satisfy you, I can arrange, if you come here yourself, for you to borrow a jetski, and for you to play around in the proximity of a Spanish patrol boat, to see if they will use you as target practice this time ? Howzat ?

 

[landlockedpirate]

Now if that doesn't satisfy you, I can arrange, if you come here yourself, for you to borrow a jetski, and for you to play around in the proximity of a Spanish patrol boat, to see if they will use you as target practice this time ? Howzat ?

Brilliant

 

[capnsensible]

Rigger, you keep saying we. Please note that in the scheme of things, you do not matter. Your opinion is irellivant. The prime minister made his decision on facts clearly unknown to you.

However, if Chinita and yourself ever find time to visit Gibraltar, part of your nation, I will happily introduce yo to the facts of living here including a personal tour of our territorial waters.

I am sure a little nog in the Yact Club could be arranged as well!

I have spent a fair bit of time at sea around Gib on Saturday, Sunday and today. The GC were completely absent. Not one violation, not one VHF one sided challenge from the RN patrol.

Well I never......