Absolutely First Class Photo Journalism from Robert Johnson — regarding Alberta’s Tar Sands Oil Extraction — this Business Insider Article Should Be an Award Winner

© 2012 Peter Free

 

23 May 2012

 

 

Citation

 

Robert Johnson, The Canadian Oil Sand Mines Refused Us Access, So We Rented This Plane To See What They Were Up To, Business Insider (18 May 2012)

 

 

Why Robert Johnson’s work is worth a look

 

Mr. Johnson hired a pilot to fly him over Canada’s tar sands mining operation.

 

He presents 78 detail-rich photographs of what is going on in Alberta.  Written information is wisely restricted to one-liners describing (among other things):

 

up to $700,000 housing prices

 

$45,000 individual truck tires, some weighing up to 12,000 pounds

 

$55 an hour truck drivers, piloting trucks that cost up to $6 million

 

lack of public gas stations

 

mud so deep that the industry keeps huge stacks wood-product constructed transportable roadway sheets

 

largest crawling bucket-wheel on the planet

 

jumbo scale refining process

 

The article’s photographs concentrate on visually obvious aspects of these environmentally destructive processes.  They include a 3-picture comparison between undisturbed, mined, and (wood bison-grazed) reclaimed land.

 

 

And no annoying gimmicks

 

Johnson’s pictures are all conveniently published on one web-page.  You do not have to click from one to another, as you do on so many other publications’ tedious presentations.

 

 

The moral? — Outstanding and timely photo journalism

 

A+