To all smokers
THIS is an open letter to all those smokers in the Western Cape:
With all the raging fires competing with gale force winds currently polluting our skies and lungs… With all the people’s houses and property going up in smoke around us… With all the smoke inhalation, sinus and asthmatic grievances that accompany a heavily polluted sky… With all the thousands of gentle creatures and wildlife perishing needlessly in the flames: We realise that you cannot wait to get home to light up and get that tar and nicotine fix, and feel the need to smoke in your vehicle, so:
Instead of holding that burning cigarette out of the window as you drive.
Instead of getting to the last few millimetres where the smoulder temperature between puffs is a measured 800°C (and will continue to burn of the grass verge for about a minute after it has flown its last lazy arch from your open car window).
Instead of flicking that butt into the environment where it will take a recorded 18 months to 10 years to decompose… can we draw your attention to a rather small custom-built item that plays a useful role in fire prevention? Let us make you aware of the fabricated “Wildfire and Litter Preventer” built into Every motor vehicle.
If you glance down and to your left, somewhere near the gear lever is a small hinged, removable tray.
This is not designed for your chewing gum and parking meter change. It is an ashtray. It is something your grandparents thought to install in every motor vehicle to prevent forest fires and devastation.
Some motor vehicles even have more than one of these handy units that are designed as removable for your convenience.
This means that the accumulated collection of cigarette butts can be thrown away in the nearest trash receptacle when the chance permits (This does not mean a heaped pile below your driver’s side door in a darkened parking lot either.)
How many of you smokers have a perfectly clean and unused ashtray in your car right now… where did your cigarette butts go?
Perhaps if we can begin to get the thousands who flick their stompies out of the car window to partake in this useful exercise it can be a step in the right direction towards a safer, cleaner and less smoky environment. Alan Martheze Parklands