An island lost at sea sends out SOS

Thanks to the credit crunch, the British parliament has put on hold a plan to build an airport for the tiny Atlantic island of St. Helena. Twelve hundred miles off the coast of Africa and best known as the place where Napoleon once languished in exile, the British colony is still the home of about 6,500 people. Ships haven’t had much reason to stop there since the Suez Canal was built and St. Helena depends on two visits per year from an ageing mail ship for any contact with the outside world.

Needless to say, they were pretty excited about the airport:

The project, which was scheduled for 2012, galvanised islanders to plan for a future with tourism as their main income. Industry experts trained hospitality personnel; tenders were taken to build upmarket boutique accommodation. Plans were hatched to lure back hundreds of young islanders who had left St Helena in search of opportunity.

“All our plans for the future were based on the airport project,” Eric Benjamin, one of the councillors, told The Times by telephone. “We are devastated.”

With Downing Street nearly two weeks away by ship, it’s a bit hard to hold a rally.

Map: Wikipedia