A pirate’s life for me
“I don't have an eye patch, parrot or wooden leg but I can assure you I am a Pirate.”
Hollywood paints a fairly dastardly picture of pirates as lying, thieving rogues with no moral compass. But we implore you to think again, as does Tony Cummins aka Captin Tonz, a genuine life long pirate. His story, though peppered with arrests, smuggling might just convince you that its possible to do the wrong thing for the right reason
Anthony Brian Cummins was born in a pub in Cambridge, England in 1944. At the age of 14, he ran away to sea, sailing around the world with the old Blue star line. Arriving in South Africa, naive to apartheid laws, he was immediately arrested for talking to the native population. He was deported off to Mozambique, and having never seen an aeroplane before, was suddenly on one. At 17 he boarded a Swedish ship, learnt an array of marine skills which eventually caught the attention of a rival ship.
“That ship was owned by a Pirate Captain. I became a Pirate.
I've smuggled everything, except arms and I'm known for smuggling camels into Saudi Arabia. I've captured ships, I've stolen ships, and done all the things Pirates are supposed to do. I've been arrested in the USA, UK (so many times), Germany, Poland, Russia, Sweden. France, Cambodia, the Philippines and South Africa.”
So far, so pirate?
But putting all the illegal stuff aside for the moment, pirates also have a a deep connection with the oceans and the creatures that inhabit them. They are alert to threats: natural and manmade. Tony’s most recent passion is to help with the global effort to clear the oceans of plastic, with a focus on microplastics.
Micro-plastics are prevalent in rivers, lakes and oceans the world over. In a study the River Thames was found to have about 80 microplastic particles per litre. While the full impact is not known, studies have shown that they harm marine life and conservation bodies are in agreement that the time to act is now, before further detrimental effects can take root.
Tony is proposing a simple, natural solution to the problem of micro-plastics: temporarily repopulating the rivers and oceans around the world with mussels, starting with the Thames.
“Mussels are the seas natural cleaners; all the need is a new broom”
A single mussel can filter up to 30 litres of water per day, meaning the potential for whole beds of mussels to clean thousands of litres of water each day is enormous. The mussels wouldn’t be used for human consumption, and would only be there temporarily. It is a solution that would need to be done in conjunction with efforts to reduce the flow of plastics into our water supply altogether.
Tony has put together a plan, mapping out the starting costs (£100k) logistics requirements and the possibilities for sponsorship and funding. It might seem like a long shot but there has also been a recent independent study done by the University of Plymouth to look seriously at the viability of using mussels so there is clear interest from the scientific community.
If you’re interested in knowing more about this project, send me an email, or to read more about Tony’s tales of life at sea, visit his website.