SPAIN: FIERCE GALES KEEP CLEAN UP VESSELS IN PORT AS ANOTHER OIL SLICK FROM STRICKEN TANKER PRESTIGE THREATENS COAST
Record ID:
344845
SPAIN: FIERCE GALES KEEP CLEAN UP VESSELS IN PORT AS ANOTHER OIL SLICK FROM STRICKEN TANKER PRESTIGE THREATENS COAST
- Title: SPAIN: FIERCE GALES KEEP CLEAN UP VESSELS IN PORT AS ANOTHER OIL SLICK FROM STRICKEN TANKER PRESTIGE THREATENS COAST
- Date: 23rd November 2002
- Summary: (W8) LA CORUNA, NORTHERN SPAIN (NOVEMBER 21, 2002)(REUTERS) 1. WIDE OF FISHING PORT; BARRIERS AND BARRIER FITTING TEAM; TEAM GOING OUT IN DINGHY TO FIT BARRIERS; SLV PEOPLE ON ROCKS; MV BARRIER HOLDER (9 SHOTS) 0.57 2. SLV FIRE ENGINE; SLV/HAS BARRIER AT WORK IN SEA (4 SHOTS) 1.20 3. MV COORDINATOR OF EMERGENCY SERVICES JOSE NOBUEIRA (BEIGE JACKET) WITH WORKER 1.25 4. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) NOBUEIRA, SAYING "The local Govt called me at six o'clock to organise barriers around the town, to make sure the oil does not get inside the city." 1.53 5. MV PEOPLE WATCHING WORK ON BARRIERS; SLV LOCAL RESIDENT WITH POLICE (2 SHOTS) 2.15 6. SLV DINGHY AT SEA; SLV BARRIER ON ROCKS; SLV WORKERS ON ROCKS; MV WOMAN WATCHING WORKERS (6 SHOTS) 2.49 7. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) LOCAL RESIDENT MARIA, SAYING: "I am really sad to see that in my country, I wish we could have more help." 3.02 8. SLV PEOPLE WATCHING BARRIER WORK; SLV PEOPLE WORKING ON BARRIERS (3 SHOTS) 3.13 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 8th December 2002 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: LA CORUNA, NORTHERN SPAIN
- Country: Spain
- Reuters ID: LVA80ABLFH2HCQ4HM1JPCRLX1752
- Story Text: Fierce gales and huge waves kept clean-up vessels in
port on Wednesday as another oil slick from the sunken tanker
Prestige menaced Spain's northwest coast, already polluted by
hundreds of tonnes of toxic fuel oil.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar and EU
Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio led growing calls for
a crackdown on unseaworthy ships and the bringing forward of a
ban on ageing single-hull tankers like the Prestige.
Double-hull vessels have been deemed sturdier.
Volunteers and fishermen with shovels joined the
painstaking battle to remove the stinking sludge washed ashore
from the Prestige, which snapped in two and sank 130 nautical
miles off Spain on Tuesday, six days after getting into
difficulty in a storm. While further work involving laying
barriers was conducted in anticipation of a second slick.
It could prove to be one of the world's worst oil spills
as the ship carried twice as much as the Exxon Valdez spewed
out when it ran aground in Alaska in 1989, stamping on the
world's mind the most devastating oil spill environmental
disaster.
The Prestige took most of her 77,000 tonnes of fuel oil to
the ocean floor some 3.6 km (two miles) below, but at least
10,000 tonnes is believed to have leaked into the Atlantic.
Four specialist pollution-control ships from Germany,
France, Norway and Britain were on their way to the disaster
scene but strong winds and six-metre (20 ft) high waves forced
three other ships already in the area to stay in dock.
The Spanish government has put a price of at least 42
million euros ($42.05 million) on the clean-up from the
disaster triggered by the Liberian-owned Prestige, which was
sailing under a Bahamas flag.
"The means available are never sufficient, but we have a
reasonable plan," Deputy Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy told
state television on Thursday. "There are more than 500 people
there trying to remove the slick... There could always be
more."
Local residents in Spain's northwest Galicia region
criticised a lack of resources and organisation in tackling
the disaster, which has already tainted some 300 km (190
miles) of scenic coast and threatens the area's economic
lifeblood of fishing.
A tanker expert said oil in the wreck of the Prestige
could be as thick as chewing gum due to pressures on the sea
bed and was unlikely to cause new catastrophic slicks soon.
"In our experience, if a ship is going to break up it will
do so on the way down," Ian White, managing director of the
London-based International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation
(ITOPF), told Reuters.
"Once they're on the bottom they tend to be fairly stable,
especially with oil like this which is very viscous," he said.
The cold of the water and crushing pressures 3.6 km (two
miles) down on the sea bed where the Prestige was meant the
oil "will stay semi-solid, with the consistency of chewing gum
at the least", he said. ITOPF is funded by tanker owners.
Spain's Development Ministry, which handles maritime
affairs, said in a statement an oil slick close to where the
Prestige sank had remained the same size, suggesting the ship
was not leaking oil from the sea bed below.
On the political front, Palacio told the European
Parliament: "We could have avoided the Prestige oil spill."
She proposed tighter controls on ships at European Union
ports and swifter introduction of a ban on single-hulled
vessels, currently not due to take full effect until 2015.
Aznar echoed her call in a letter to European Commission
President Romano Prodi.
He also proposed the immediate introduction of a Maritime
Safety Agency and the creation of a European compensation fund
for disasters like the Prestige spill.
At the rugged Mar de Fora beach in Finisterre, a town
meaning Land's End, blackened waves pounded the picturesque
half-moon bay after the oil hit the shore.
About 10 metres (yards) of black sludge covered the sand
where the tide had gone out, grounding a sea bird that was
covered in sludge up to its neck.
Rocky areas to either side of the beach oozed with oil
about 15 cm (six inches) thick.
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