Towing into deep waters was 'folly', writes
Ray Smuts
THERE IS still no end in sight to the world's worst oil pollution disaster involving seabirds and costs of the huge clean-up operation are steadily mounting following the sinking of the huge ore carrier Treasure off Cape Town on June 23.
Giving further rise for concern is that in spite of holes in the hull being sealed by divers, more heavy bunker oil has since leaked from the ruptured ship lying in 50 meters of water 12km off the west coast.
About 400 tons of oil has leaked from the vessel thus far, threatening the Port of Cape Town and world-class oceanarium, and forcing the closure of a number of beaches including those at Mouille Point, Sea Point, Clifton, Llandudno and Sandy Bay.
Specialised pumping equipment and a three-member team of divers arrived from Holland last week and will be involved in removing the remaining 900 tons of oil from the wreck. Due in position over the Treasure as FTW went to print was a barge/diving platform towed from Durban by the salvage tug John Ross.
Sharp criticism about the manner in which the whole Treasure saga has been handled by maritime authorities has come from former naval commander Nic Smit, once master of SAS Tafelberg and SAS Drakensberg.
He believes it was folly to attempt to tow the Treasure into deep waters and that the authorities should have foreseen that if a vessel with such a large hole in its hull (17 by 11 meters) was towed backwards, the front section would break off.
Smit says if the vessel had been towed to shallow waters off Robben Island and the oil pumped out, it (Robben Island) and Dassen Island, where 50 000 penguins are having to be evacuated, would not have come under threat.
The most cutting criticism comes from Ian MacDonald, chief executive officer of the Worldwide Fund for Nature South Africa, who says the South African Maritime Safety Association (SAMSA) should be held accountable for the diasaster - what he terms an absolute disgrace.
In full agreement with Mc Donald is Green Party spokesman Glenn Ashton who says the Treasure should never have been towed to deeper waters in such large swells, rather, that she could have been kept in a lee off Robben Island or even beached as there was no leaking oil at that stage.
He blames SAMSA and the Department of Environmental Affairs for not doing enough to prevent the disaster. SAMSA in turn has denied it made an error of judgment and asserted it would not handle future similar cases in a different way.
n In what has been described as a disaster of international dimensions and a logistical nightmare, 12 000 birds had been evacuated from Robben Island by the weekend. At Dassen Island, home to some 50 000 birds, 20 000 oil-free birds have been being removed to the cleaner waters of Algoa Bay and will be allowed to swim back over a period of about ten days, by which time it is hoped the oil would have cleared up.
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