[Note: Although I'm a fan of their efforts, I'm not affiliated with Ocean Builders. Just passing this along, per their request. See the comments for Chad's statement. Please direct inquiries and offers of assistance to elwartowski@protonmail.com.]
We at Ocean Builders would first like to thank all of the people who have sent their support and help. We do appreciate it.
It has been reported that the first seastead, XLII, has been or is in the process of being demolished by the Thai navy. It is also being reported that our first residents, Chad Elwartowski and Nadia Summergirl are being held responsible for building the seastead and putting it in its current location.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Chad and Nadia were volunteers excited about the prospect of living free. They took pictures and videos of the whole process and posted it on social media. They spent a few weeks on the seastead and documented their adventure. They were in no way involved in the design, construction, decision on where it was located or any funding for the construction of the seastead. If you read the Reason article that describes the seastead accurately writes the facts:
” The team surrounding the project were early adopters of bitcoin, and with wealth acquired that way it has spent around $150,000 on the project “ Other news articles took this to mean that Chad Elwartowski funded the project because he was also an early adopter of bitcoin. Chad did not spend any of his own money on the project other than perhaps some sheets for the bed and he brought all of his own dishware when he moved in.
Chad and Nadia are safe for now but understand that Thailand is currently being run by a military dictator. There will be no trial if they are caught. They already demonstrated that by being judge jury and executioner of the historic very first seastead.
The reason Thailand was chosen was due to the large amount of tourism, its relatively calm seas and also because all of those involved love the Thai people and their culture.
It is claimed by the Thai navy through their media mouth pieces that the seastead is in a shipping lane. This makes it sound like there is heavy cargo traffic coming to Phuket. If anyone knows Phuket, they have one cargo port that gets maybe one or two cargo ships a week. They also admit that the seastead is in international waters, at least 12 nautical miles from land. This would infer that they are 12 nautical miles from land on either side of the seastead which would put the shipping lane at at least 24 nautical miles. The seastead is 6 meters wide. It has a very bright anchor beacon and has a registered AIS beacon which can be detected by any boat with any sort of navigation in the vicinity.
The area is a heavy fishing area with many many fishing boats trawling the water there daily. The fishing boat captains used to wave at Nadia and Chad as they passed by. They were in no way bothered by the floating home. The seastead takes up less space in the shipping lane than a fishing boat.
Needless to say. This event has doubled down our efforts and we can all clearly see that seasteading needs to happen now as tyranny creeps ever more deeply into our governments to the point that they are willing to hunt down a couple of residents residing in a floating house in middle of nowhere.
We hope this issue can be resolved diplomatically with the Thai government and are ready to talk to anyone in charge at any time. We have tried several times to talk to anyone but were always told that we have nothing to worry about because we are legally in international waters.
The April 15th sale of seasteads is to be postponed until we can get everything straightened out and figure out the best path forward for everyone.
https://ocean.builders/official-statement-about-the-sinking-of-the-first-seastead/
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