Tenerife Magazine’s round up of some of the most interesting news stories of the week in Tenerife.
The Right Stuff
Not many people will have heard of Eugenio Maldonado Villaluenga who died last week. However, the 27 passengers and crew of a DC-3 flying from Los Rodeos airport to La Palma in September 1966 won’t need reminding of his name. Shortly after take-off, one of the engines failed sending the plane plummeting toward the earth. Pilot Eugenio Maldonado Villaluenga kept his calm and managed to regain enough control to keep the plane from crashing into the populated areas along the north coast of Tenerife. As soon as he cleared land he brought the DC-3 down as safely as he could in the sea near El Sauzal. Remarkably, thanks to his skill as a pilot, no-one died in the crash; the only fatality was a passenger who died of a heart attack after the plane had been ditched in the sea. Fishermen from El Sauzal were soon on the scene to administer first aid and transport passengers back to terra firma as the plane sank below the waters. It still lies there today, visited only by the occasional diver. Incredibly, because of the oppressive law at the time, Eugenio Maldonado Villaluenga could have been prosecuted and even shot. But accounts of his heroism in the face of almost certain tragedy saved his life. He was, and is, a true local hero.
Discovery of a New Planetary Nebula Announced in Tenerife
A what? Admittedly it’s hardly going to cause a ripple amongst the sun loungers on Playa Las Vistas but the announcement shows that there are a lot more things taking place on Tenerife than a bit of tan topping. Although it wasn’t actually spotted here its discovery was revealed at the Planetary Nebulae: An Eye to the Future conference in Puerto de la Cruz last week. And just for anyone who’s interested, in layman’s terms (so apologies if this isn’t scientifically on the nose) a planetary nebula is the last gasp of a dying star, a translucent jellyfish-like puff in space. It’s what the sun might eventually look like when everything goes pear shaped ““ so basically a big deal to scientists. Now, where’s my factor 15?
Rock Stars on Tenerife
Here’s a question. How many non-Spanish on Tenerife have heard of Juanes? He’s a Colombian singer who has won 17 Latin Grammy awards and sold more than 13 million albums. Last week he played a gig in Adeje that attracted 7 thousand fans. A few weeks ago Michael Bolton performed in Adeje and was seen by only around four and a half thousand people. Looks like on Tenerife it’s a safer bet for concert organisers to book Latin stars rather than English speaking ones…or is that all down to which ‘international stars” they actually choose?
Playa San Marcos
At last good news for one of Tenerife’s beaches affected by rock fall. The road to the harbour at Playa San Marcos below Icod de los Vinos has reopened after being closed for nearly a month due to landslides.
Things are Getting a Bit Fruity at Tenerife Sur
Spain’s Medio Ambiente (Dept of the Environment) have chosen Tenerife Sur airport as one of five Spanish airports to be involved in a campaign to promote Spanish fruit and vegetables to foreign visitors. The campaign includes information and the chance to taste a selection of Spain’s best fruit and veg. Nothing wrong with that except who exactly is it aimed at? Visitors arriving or leaving? When any of us arrive anywhere all we want to do is to get to our destination as soon as possible. How many people think ‘after getting up at 3am, getting to the airport two hours before the plane takes off and being cramped in a plane for four and a half hours what I’d really like to do is hang about the airport for a bit longer and eat a banana.” On the other hand when someone hands you a delicious slice of paraguayo just as you’re about to get on the plane home are you going to think, ‘damn ““ I wish someone had told me about this little beauty when I arrived.”
And finally the TIT (This Is Tenerife) of the week award goes to…the majority of Tenerife’s councils
At Tenerife Magazine.com we continually surf the web to keep an eye on what’s happening in both Tenerife’s online English and Spanish speaking world. Part of this involves checking out what each of the island’s ayuntamientos (local councils) are up to. It’s not an easy task. Whilst much of the world has been racing forward at warp speed in terms of IT, many of Tenerife’s councils have been moving forward at the speed of oxen at an agricultural fair. In fact some have clearly given up and gone back to the cow shed. Some council websites haven’t developed in years. This was reinforced last week by the results of a survey into e-government in Tenerife. Out of the island’s thirty-one municipalities only seven had implemented some form of e-government where residents were able to carry out council related actions on-line. These were Santa Cruz, Tegueste, La Laguna, Adeje, Arona and El Sauzal.
Some others were “Working on it” and if you live in Santa Ursula or La Orotava you can at least apply online to open an off-licence or burn stubble (clearly high priority stuff) but that is about it.
The real dunces in the pack are Tacoronte, El Tanque, Los Silos, El Rosario and Puerto de la Cruz where they clearly think internet is a place where pescadores want fish to go.
Lame excuses of “We’re working on it, and sorry, haven’t got around to that yet” just don’t cut the mustard. It’s about time they realised what it says to the rest of the world is “We haven’t a clue what we’re doing.”
