Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is reportedly having a new “record-breaking” superyacht built by a Dutch company that is so tall that it won’t fit a particular bridge in the city of Rotterdam. Rather than see that as a problem with his boat, Bezos is requesting that the bridge be dismantled. And apparently when you have Bezos’ sort of obscene wealth, you’re allowed to just do that sort of thing.
Last week, a spokesperson for the city’s mayor confirmed to news outlets that Bezos would be paying (via the shipbuilder) to have the middle part of the Koningshaven Bridge temporarily dismantled, though after some intense backlash, the city has walked that back and are now saying they’re still just considering the idea.
The move is controversial because the steel bridge has a long history, and is now a national monument. It previously went through a major renovation which saw it out of action from 2014 to 2017, when officials said it would not be dismantled again.
A number of Dutch locals have expressed their opposition to the idea and have promised that if the bridge is dismantled for Bezos’ yacht, they’ll be there when it passes through, armed with rotten eggs and ready to pelt.
Nearly 4,000 people has RSVP’d yes to a Facebook event titled “Throwing eggs at superyacht Jeff Bezos.” 13,000 more have said they’re “interested” in the event.
“Calling all Rotterdammers, take a box of rotten eggs with you and let’s throw them en masse at Jeff’s superyacht when it sails through the Hef in Rotterdam,” reads the event page.
The event’s organizer Pablo Strörmann told the NL Times (via NPR) that the idea started as a joke and got “way out of hand.” I guess that’s bound to happen with this good an idea.
Curbed reporter Clio Chang looked into how difficult it would actually be to hit Bezos’ boat and estimates “an egg would have to travel about 238 feet to hit the hull. A difficult, but not impossible, feat.”
What else did we see out there today:
- Zooey Deschanel has joined the cast of the live-action adaptation of Harold and the Purple Crayon. (via Collider)
- Angelina Jolie appeared before Congress to advocate for the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act. (via Variety)
- A new clip from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 has been released. (via Comicbook.com)
- Sex & the City’s Mario Cantone says he was cut from The Tonight Show in the 80s because he’s gay and the show worried his jokes would make Johnny Carson “nervous.” (via HuffPost)
- It looks like Amazon’s Lord of the Rings show is going to give us a very different Galadriel than the movies or the books. (via ScreenRant)
What did you all see out there today?
(image: Morgane Perraud on Unsplash)
