Our toxic air

No surprises that our air is a toxic soup (June 19) thanks to traffic and construction.

The mystery is that we still call it ‘construction’. Surely, the time has long passed that in Malta this should be changed to ‘destruction’. In terms of our health; in terms of other people’s (collapsing/damaged/ruined amenities and value) properties; in terms of our environment; in terms of causing more congestion and hence traffic… Last but not least, offering a tourist product by delivering ugliness, never-ending dirt and vandalising so much heritage in the process. What’s constructive about it?

Anna Micallef – Sliema

Irresponsible

The report on the court’s decision to award compensation to a land owner who sold his property as he repeatedly was denied development permits but then discovered that the buyer got a supermarket permit and trebled his invested money in a few months confirms that in Malta we never had and we will never have real ODZs. Period.

What we do have are temporary ODZs. Protected land only remains so until the right money is pushed around, abusedly rather than fruitfully.

This particular case is very telling due to its close proximity to the extended centreline of runway 05. The justified concerns of the Civil Aviation Directorate and MIA were ignored in preference to an exuberant deal.

Statistics prove that most aircraft incidents occur during landings and take offs. Planes may either fail to take off or fail to stop on the runway, technically referred to as overshooting.

On August 16, 1968, a USAF aircraft from what was Wheelus Air Base in Libya had an engine flameout over the Mediterranean and the pilot skillfully diverted to Malta gliding the plane to a perfect landing. However, with no engine and hydraulic power he could not engage the wheel and air brakes, overshot the runway, crossed the road and careered to a stop in the fields.

The photo (above), which I took soon after the incident, depicts the consequences. The aircraft is positioned a few metres away from the Lidl parking lot is now located. It was providential that no one was hurt.

This was not the only such accident at our airport. However,  this did not deter the planning officials from issuing the permit, putting the lives of customers and employees at more risk than any other outlet in Malta. If this is not evil irresponsibility I wonder what is.

As one anthropologist put it in this paper many years ago and which I have been repeating ad nauseam, “everything is possible in Malta as long as there is a commercial reason”.

I admire contributors who can describe such a daunting situation in just one short simple truthful sentence.

Still things have not changed.

Victor Pisani – Santa Luċija

Fire at Ramla Bay

It seems the island inhabitants are not satisfied with ruining the islands with ugly, largely unnecessary, construction activity but are now hell-bent on burning one of the few remaining pleasant places to extinction. I know that the island politicians don’t have much consideration for the flora and fauna but I thought the normal inhabitants would care.

It seems the saying that ‘the people get the politicians they deserve’ could be endorsed with ‘the people get the environment they deserve’.

I am an island-loving foreigner who has had a holiday home on the islands for the last 24 years.

David Wynn – Glashütten,  Germany

Gifts with a purpose

Rosianne Cutajar is in trouble again for offering oranges to residents in an old peoples’ home in her home town. Presumably, these oranges were bought, for there are no local ones at this time of the year. She is not the first one to do it, nor will she be the last.

When I was head of the primary school in Dingli in 1981, the wives of ministers Lorry Sant and Vincent Moran came to the school to distribute to the children chocolates, which had been confiscated by customs officers from holidaymakers returning to Malta from abroad.

Joseph Muscat – Attard

Letters to the editor should be sent to editor@timesofmalta.com. Please include your full name, address and ID card number. The editor may disclose personal information to any person or entity seeking legal action on the basis of a published letter.