Photo of Dredging in Great Barrier Reef: Real or Hoax?

An image circulating online allegedly shows a dredging ship in the Great Barrier Reef. Is this true or false?

The photo was not taken in the Great Barrier Reef. 

Let’s first take a look at how the image is being presented. A photo of a dredging ship includes the following caption:

“This is as ugly as it gets. Dredging 40km off the Great Barrier Reef occurring NOW just to make money for coal mining.

This Government stinks.”

The image, which has been shared thousands of times on Facebook with the above caption, actually shows a dredging ship in the process of creating Palm Islands in Dubai back in 2001.

Palm Islands

The image above shows one of several dredgers which sprayed a total of 94 million cubic meters of sand to create the island’s “palm fronds.” The process was guided by GPS technology, which allowed extremely precise placement of the sand, with a margin of error of less than half an inch.

Bottom Line

The photo above does not show a dredging ship in the Great Barrier Reef. It was taken in 2001 during the creation of Palm Islands in Dubai.

Sources

• The Impact of the Palm Islands, United Arab Emirates: Construction of the Islands (Tida Choomchaiyo, December 5, 2009)
• Palm Islands (Wikipedia)