Chile
Gondwana GIS
Tierra
del Fuego - The Land of Fire. The fires were the camp fires of the Fuegian
Indians. In one version,Magellan saw smoke only and called it Tierra del Humo,
the Land of Smoke, but Charles V said there was nosmoke without fire and changed
the name... The Fuegians are dead and all the fires snuffed out. Only the
flares of oil rigs cast a pall over the night sky.
Bruce Chatwin, In Patagonia
November 27, 2000 Bruce Willett, Nelson Sanchez and Kevin Maloney
Last
week Nelson and I made a trip out to Tierra Del Fuego with Kevin Maloney,
a freelance photojournalist with the New York Times and National Geographic.
Look for our pictures pasted all over these publications soon. Kevin is down
in Patagonia working on several photojournalism projects concerning Trillium/Savia,
greenhouse gases and the birds Patagonia.
We headed out with
great weather to Puerto Arturo on the southwest side of the island. This is
the location where Trillium/Savia has plans to build the new port for their
Rio Condor logging project. 
These
plans are still open, but things are changing as I write. All seemed quiet
on the Trillium/Savia front.
When we went to visit Trillium/Savia's logging and research camp on Lote 2,
all was very quiet. Too quiet on the Trillium/Savia side but much noise on
the adjoining estancia of Cooperativa Timaukel.
While
we are are rightly concerned with Trillium/Savia's Rio Condor project, some
of the neighboring estancias are making plans to develop their property. With
little concern and oversight from the public these could be damaging projects.
We spent some time on the land of Cooperativa Timaukel where a new project
is being conducted to build roads and develop the forests. On our first day,
we were heading out Cameron just as it was getting dark. Lots of truck traffic
pasted us as we headed south along a normally loney strch of gravel road.
A bit lost, we headed up another formerly loney road to find ourselves in
a heavy equipment yard filled with large heavy earth movers, dump trucks and
other equipment. We stopped into the house and were met by the friendly couple
looking after the equipment. They had just gotten there that week and said
work was just starting up. After inviting us for dinner and telling us were
it was good to camp, we all went to bed. Early the next day the trucks and
heavy equipment started up.
Several companies and estancias are involved in the project. Cooperativa Timaukel owns the 18,000 hectares of land, much of it developable forest. Forestal Russfin own the timber mill processing the lumber coming out of the property. HR Contructora Ltda. and VHF Ingenieros Ltda are the engineering companies devoloping the roads and Trillium/Savia is an adjoining landowner that will benefit from new roads in the area.