TAPs most popular destination, Water Shortages, Recycling Batteries

Source : Diário de Notícias 18/1/2008

TAP (The Portuguese Airline) have published some figures about their air traffic during 2007. It seem that their scheduled flights between Lisbon and Madeira are the most popular of all their routes with 559 thousand passengers using that service last year. Throughout the year, TAP transported nearly 8 million passengers, and increase of over 12% on 2006.

I assume that means that there must be 559,000 very rich and tolerant people living in Portugal somewhere. TAP’s reputation for ‘out of touch’ pricing, poor customer service (lost baggage, delays, poor information etc) is unenviable, and it seems crazy that it is much cheaper to fly to the UK and take another plane to Lisbon, than to fly direct with TAP, and does not send good signals for environmental concerns either.

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Just 18 days into January, and already there are concerns about the shortage of rain (in the right places) and the possibility of water shortages during the comming summer. Apparently reserves are already low due to a dry 2007, and already there are negative signs about the year to come. Nothing will be sure until the normally rainy months of March and April have passed.

I am not sure that this is really about the amount of rainfall, more like the ability to capture it. A tour guide told me several years ago that more than 90% of the rainfall on Madeira goes straight into the sea. Does anyone know if that was / is true?

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Just going back to that recycling topic from a couple of days ago, did you know there are recycling points on Madeira for batteries too? They are red plastic bins, usually strapped to lamposts or simlar, with a couple of small slots near the top. The one I have used for the last 4 years has always been stuffed full of other rubbish with hardly any room for batteries. It had been emptied yesterday for the first time I can remember.  I know the school in São Jõao encourages kids to use the battery recycling point near them, as they get given money for the dead batteries collected.

I have asked before for photographs of the new year, and at times I have been sent other photos to publish. If anyone has any quality photos of anything beautiful or interesting connected with Madeira they would like to have published either on the blog or on the website, please send them in to pics@madeira4u.com. Likewise if you have any interesting news or stories, I would delighted to publish them here … just one condition, don’t get me into copyright problems. All contributions will be acknowledged unless I am asked not to. Many thanks … Der

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