Spiral Island

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article or section needs sources or references that appear in reliable, third-party publications.
Primary sources and sources affiliated with the subject of the article are generally not sufficient for a Wikipedia article. Please include more appropriate citations from reliable sources, or discuss the issue on the talk page.
This article has been tagged since May 2008.

This article is about an artificial island. For Robert Smithson's sculpture, see Spiral Jetty.

Spiral Island back in early March 2000

Spiral Island was a floating artificial island in a lagoon near Puerto Aventuras, on the Caribbean coast of Mexico south of Cancún. It was built by British eco-pioneer Richart (or "Rishi") Sowa beginning in 1998; he filled nets with empty discarded plastic bottles to support a structure of plywood and bamboo, on which he poured sand and planted numerous plants, including mangroves. It was destroyed by Hurricane Emily in 2005.^[1] Sowa is building a new island in Isla Mujeres, Mexico.

The original island sported a two-story house, a solar oven, a self-composting toilet, and three beaches. He used some 250,000 bottles for the 66ft (20 m) by 54 ft (16 m) structure. The mangroves were planted to help keep the island cool, and some of them rose up to 15 ft (5 m) high.

Sowa is a musician, artist, and carpenter. Now in his fifties, he is an environmentalist who believes in recycling and low-impact living.

A book about Rishi's journey in building the original island and his philosophies, titled "Spirologically Speaking" written by the German author Tanja Samed along with Rishi, is due to be released in 2008.

Rishi's Spiral Island has been featured in a number of newspapers around the world and was featured in an episode of the Ripley's Believe It or Not! TV show.

1 Loss and reconstruction
2 New island
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Loss and reconstruction

During the hurricane in 2005, Spiral Island was washed completely onto the beach in one piece, with a small percentage of the bags of bottles washed up on the beach away from where it landed. The roots of the 7 year old 7 meter tall mangroves were intertwined through the island's base and the strong net that was wrapped totally under the whole Island.

The island did not sink, but was instead thrown up on the beach almost completely intact.

Almost all of the sand Rishi Sowa used for Spiral Island at Puerto Aventuras was taken from the end of the beach, where it came up against the man made rock pier on the edge of the canal system where the Island was tied. Due to the prevailing winds beach sand was constantly being piled up because of the constant motion of the waves and wind. The beach sand was dredged out using large machinery so that boats could continue to come through the canal. Since Rishi only gathered up 8 to 10 large buckets per week, the builders of Puerto Aventuras canal did not need to dredge it again as Rishi was doing it for them.

[edit] New island

Rishi Sowa is building a new Spiral Island in the waters of Isla Mujeres, the Island of Women. His new island is in the early stages of development and construction (as of November 23, 2007).

The new Spiral Island is about 13 meters (40 feet) long so far, with plants and mangroves already growing on the island. The new Spiral Island also has a beach. A few volunteers are camping at the beach and helping with the project.

In September 2007, a Spiral Islanders social network site was set up for those interested in Spiral Island and discussions about floating islands, ecology, marine life, and sustainable eco-friendly living. SpiralIslanders.com