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Bloomberg News tells us:
South Korea’s coast guard sent boats to contain the country’s biggest oil spill in more than a decade after a Hong Kong-registered supertanker collided with a barge.
About 81,000 barrels of crude oil was spilt after a crane on the barge crashed into the Hebei Spirit at 7:15 a.m. local time, Jeong Seon Mun, deputy director of the maritime safety information center at South Korea’s Ministry of Maritime Affairs & Fisheries, said. The ship was anchored 5 miles (8 kilometers) northwest of the Taean peninsula at the time.
The leak is almost a third of the 37,000 tons spilled into Prince William Sound, Alaska, by the Exxon Valdez in 1989, according to data on the International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation’s Web site. The Taean Coast Guard deployed 12 patrol boats and 3 accident control vessels, Jeong said today.
“Oil is still spilling,” Jeong said by telephone in Seoul. “The police face difficulty in carrying out the operation because high waves make it hard to contain the spill.” Continue Reading…
Tags: · barge, coast_guard, crane, crude_oil, Environment, Heavy Lift, maritime_affairs, maritime_safety, marpol, MARPOL Incidents, oil_spill, south_korea, Tankers
I have been amazed lately by the number of errors in both media reports and political commentary related to the the container ship Cosco Busan that allided with San Francisco’s Bay Bridge. We first reported on the confusion between the words allision and collision but that debate is mostly semantic. The errors have grown as the debate has reached a national audience.
The most troubling mistake is reports that infer or flatly state the vessel is a tanker. This mistake has been made numerous times as can be seen by doing a simple google news search for the incorrect term but most seriously in USA Today’s, America’s most widely distributed newspaper, headline (page A6 of November 12th’s edition): “Coast Guard: Tanker crew tested for substances.”
The media is not the only “informed” party making this mistake. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on a statement by San Francisc’s mayor:
Newsom saw the disaster as an even larger statement on the weakness of America’s dependence on oil.
“We can do better than large oil tankers coming in and out of the bay of San Francisco, and move to a more energy independent future,” he said at Crissy Field. “We’ll continue to have these kinds of disasters inevitably if we continue to have more tankers come in and out to feed our addiction.”
So for those in the media or with a passing interest here is a picture of an Oil Tanker and the Cosco Busan:
The major difference between the two is: a tanker transports liquids and a container ship transports containers filled with solids (i.e. toys, home furnishings, industrial supplies…). So before the flood of emails arrive… if the ship that hit the San Francisco Bay Bridge was not transporting any liquids why did it have 58,000 gallons aboard? The answer is… for the same reason your car carries 24 gallons of gasoline.
The fuel spilled in the bay was all to be used by the ship’s enormous engines during the long transit back to China. Had this ship been an oil tanker the spill could have been as large as the one caused by the oil tanker Exxon Valdez… then again probably not since the oil in those ships are now required to be protected by a double hull.
Tags: · bay_bridge, coast_guard, Container Ship, container_ship, cosco_busan, Engines, Environment, marpol, MARPOL Incidents, news, oil_spill, San Francisco, san_francisco, Tankers, USA_today, USCG
After a short break our morning smiles can return with a continuation of the Ship Of The Day blog. For those just joining our audience the blog showcases the most interesting ship visiting Rotterdam that day. As an example here’s today’s post:
Today’s SotD is the crude oil tanker Harad (IMO: 9220952, port of registry: Nassau, Bahama’s) which is 333 metres long, 56 metres wide and has a draught of 22.5 metres. These dimensions give the vessel a deadweight tonnage of 303,000. The vessel is owned by the National Shipping Company of Saudi Arabia and operated by Mideast Ship Management Limited. She was built in 2001 by Samsung Heavy Industries, Korea and is powered by a 44,640 HP Samsung engine.
The Harad is scheduled to arrive later this evening at the TEAM terminal, Rotterdam Europoort.
Links:
For more interesting Maritime Blogs visit:
Tags: · Blogroll, Community, crude_oil_tanker, imo, rotterdam_europoort, shipping_company, ship_management, Tankers
Photo slideshow of the world’s largest ship ever built the (now) FSO Knock Nevis.
A graphical Comparison: [Continue Reading →]
Tags: · fpso, knock-nevis, largest, largest_ship, photo_slideshow, Tankers, Video, world-record, youtube
This photo was emailed to our tips address. It’s showing the aptly named tanker M/V Wave Ruler battling Hurricane Dean during a voyage to deliver aid to the Cayman Islands.
The Shipping Times carries the Wave Ruler’s story in the article: British naval ships assist Belize after Hurricane Dean
Hurricane Dean in the shipping news:
UPDATE: Robin Storm has a good Hurricane Dean wrap-up story:
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After experiencing a steering problem the tanker “White Sea” ran aground off of Coney Island New York. The Gotahamist tells us:
The White Sea, has run aground in the Ambrose Channel, which is a shipping channel south of Lower New York Bay, off Staten Island, Coney Island, Breezy Point and NJ’s Sandy Hook. The Coast Guard says that there are no reports of injuries.
The 800-foot tanker is carrying 455,000 gallons of “low sulfur fuel oil”, none of which has spilled. The Coast Guard says “the ship’s crew deployed a containment boom in case anything were to leak,” per the Staten Island Advance. Read More…
WNBC has a good photo slideshow of the tanker HERE. Read the original Maritime News Discoverer Story HERE. Read about proposed changes to the Coney Island Amusement Park HERE
If you have any further info or links on this story please post them as a comment below or email us: tips @ gcaptain.com
UPDATE: [Continue Reading →]
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