Here's a surprise and a warning that fully merits press attention - even though one wishes this story had gone through rewrite once more and lingered longer at the art director's desk. It's fascinating but blends in so many ways that geologically prominent or scenic places on Scotland landscape are being looted or defaced that the central and surprising theme - sloppy geological sampling - gets blurred.
- BBC - Steven McKenzie: Rock drilling 'threatens' Scotland's geology ;
The piece would be better were readers to be able to see an example of what sources tell McKenzie about damage to scenery by the occasional thoughtless geologist out for a core sample. The photo you see here is not from the Beeb, but from a report at an organization, Scottish Natural Heritage, that prompted the news story. The story does link to the report. At BBC's site one finds only a scenic, file photo of undamaged, lichen-covered boulders at the edge of a lake or a bay, and another photo of some fossiliferous rocks smashed apart by looters or other collectors. That last one is pertinent to a topic that comes up deeper in the story regarding additional threats, aside from the odd geologist, to Scotland's natural heritage.
Among the more interesting bits in this report is that rules governing geology sampling exist in formal standards - the nation already has a Code of Conduct for Rock Coring and a complementary Scottish Core Code. I suppose the US and its states have some of those too. But I can't recall one of them coming up in a news story.
- Charlie Petit
