Grounded ore carrier refloated off Saldanha

A Chinese ore carrier, MV
Long Charity, was successfully
refloated on Sunday (August 2),
less than 48 hours after
running aground off the port
of Saldanha.
Fine weather greatly eased
what could have been a trickier
situation, said NPA port
manager Eugene Kearns and his
joint operations team.
The 93 000 gross tonne
vessel (174 004 metric tonnes
dwt) had just sailed from the
port, fully laden for destinations
in Asia, when an engine
breakdown caused her to run
bow-first onto a reef at Marcus
Island Breakwater, a stone’s
throw from the port.
Saldanha’s four tugs were
called to hold the vessel in
position while assistance was
sought from Svitzer Marine
Salvage and Smit Amandla
Marine.
The crew succeeded in
restarting the engines shortly
after the incident, a salvage
inspection revealing the vessel
had sustained damage to front
seawater ballast tanks.
On Sunday afternoon at high
tide she was refloated from the
marine-protected reef, what
Kearns describes as a relatively
quick operation.
No pollution was detected,
the 34-member crew safe and
the vessel at inner anchorage
pending a further decision.
The mishap is the first
involving a large vessel at
Saldanha in more than a decade.
The West coast has had its share
of fishing boat and small vessel
groundings.
South Africa’s only iron
ore export port, the two-berth
Saldanha iron ore terminal
handles an average of 20 to
25 ore carriers a month, for a
collective four million tonnes.
Enquiries have been mounted
by various bodies, including
National Ports Authority and the
South African Maritime Safety
Authority (Samsa).