Protecting the natural habitat in Alaska

Since I got my little ATV, I have read a lot of stuff about how ATVs can not go on this trail or that trail because they damage the beautiful Alaskan landscape. I kind of think the same thing applies to ATVs as applies to guns.

ATV's don't destroy natural terrain,
people destroy natural terrain.

While I agree that an ATV can be damaging, I am not arguing that, I also feel that the way the ATV is handled can lessen or increase the level of impact the ATV has on the terrain. If someone rides gently across a field it is far less damaging than someone that jockey's the ATV back and forth skidding the wheels through the soil and damaging plant life. There is also less impact noise wise between someone that rides at a putt-putt pace and someone that cranks the engine out until it screams. Do I need to cover the levels of roadside dust between someone that goes slow and someone that rides like a bat out of hell down the dusty trail beside the highway?

ATVs are only as harmful to the Alaskan environment as the person that is on the machine. Why do I bring this up, though? Because with as much as I have seen about ATVs not being allowed on some trails, you would think that the sinking of Navy ships in the Gulf would have been a bit more news worthy.

The Anchorage Daily News reported this morning that the Navy has been allotted two ships per year sunk in the Gulf of Alaska.

Read all about this at the Daily News website, Navy Gets OK to sink ships in Gulf of Alaska target practice and weigh in on your perspective on this.

I know that for me, it is so far a bit of an indecisive level. I know that sunken ships have created marine habitats where they were needed, but I also know that Alaska is the last place on the planet to have truly clean freshwater for salmon and other fishing products. Do we really need to be dropping two ships a year down into those pristine waters? I'm willing to listen to the reasons for doing so, but I can not help but think it would be a crime to intentionally sink ships to a seabed that has done quite well without our litter for so many millions of years.