Documentary highlights effect of piracy on Aldabra |17 January 2012

The atoll, which used to receive some 1,500 visitors -- mostly scientific enthusiasts – annually, is now virtually closed, resulting in a big loss of earnings for the Seychelles Islands Foundation (SIF) which manages it. 

The signs of neglect and abandonment are very obvious in the documentary which was screened yesterday at a regional workshop on piracy being held at the Berjaya Beau Vallon Bay Resort & Casino.

Aldabra boasts the biggest giant turtle population anywhere and estimated at 150,000.
It also has a fairly large population of unique birds, thousands of giant land crabs while its large lagoon teems with fish.

Sadly missing are tourists interested in conservation.
To get to Aldabra, Savy with his colleague, well-known photographer Gilbert Pool, had to fly to Assumption Island, then make the 24-mile crossing with naval escort as the threat of pirate looms everywhere.

It is to be recalled that it was on the way from Assumption Island in March 2009, after having dropped off a party of tourists from Aldabra, that Captain Francis Roucou and six other crewmen were captured aboard the Indian Ocean Explorer by Somali pirates who held them captive for three months.