Beach Head

This series of videos is particularly interesting to me. This and the two which follow chronologically were shot in South Haven, Michigan, on the shore of Lake Michigan.

Original description: Get your mind out of the gutter. John Henry, the “LowGenius,” steps up with a clear and unavoidable notice: our planet is try to kill us, because we’ve been killing it. It’s time to change, FAST, and without regard for comfort, tradition, or profit.

So as you can probably tell this was shot while the Deepwater Horizon disaster was ongoing. Having a beach and a large body of water at hand, I thought hey what a great way to illustrate this idea! Drove down to South Haven and shot three videos.

In this video, I ask the viewer to contemplate what would happen if a Deepwater Horizon type of incident happened in this place, describing walking up and down the beach as far as the eye can see only to keep tripping through tar balls and oil residue.

This was shot on or around June 26, 2010.

One month to the day from the publication of this video, a ruptured pipeline spilled around a million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River, which empties in to Lake Michigan in Saugatuck, roughly 15 miles down the beach in the direction the camera’s pointing.

Fortunately for the beach, the spill was much smaller and happened inland far enough that the oil was mostly minor soluble residues by the time it got to the lake. Unfortunately for everyone else, a million gallons of oil dumped into a river sucks, and the cleanup and damage impacts are ongoing to this day, twelve years later as of this article’s publication here at johnhenry.us.

One of many, many times in my career that I’ve inadvertently been a voice which, if heeded, would’ve possibly prevented major disasters. Of course it’s synchronicity and coincidence…mostly. But it does speak to the legitimacy of the stuff I’m trying to put over and discuss and get you talking about, when the things I say are potential outcomes of bad decision-making continue happening, often not long after I’ve said something.