HKSubaru

couldn't they have more precations for these??
http://uk.fc.yahoo.com/e/environmentalissue.html

can't believe that, think of all the birds and fish and wildlife that are gonna die because of this. This makes me angry!70,000 tonnes of it! that could be used for optimax! but on a serious note, surely they should of made more safety measures on carrying 70,000 tonnes of the stuff.

JamieMacdonald

Apparently this has happened before on other tankers made in Japan (in the 70s???). The accusation is that the steel used for the hull was too thin, a bit like the bodywork on a Scooby!

barge

its off the coast of spain so I bet my taxes will go up to give more money to the EU to help Spain recover from this, then the spanish fishermen will say they cant fish there & the EU will say they can hev exclusive rights to the waters off the british isles, about time we went back to the 70's cod war, a few gun boats sent out & sink the spanish trawlers, but we dont have a navey anymore

Brun

Why could they not of parked another tanker next to it and pumped the oil out. (Before it sunk of course)

P1Fanatic

Brun - from the pictures I saw the conditions were pretty bad so I doubt that would have been possible without risking the sinking of another tanker!

super_si

When it did go down, the sheer size and undercurrent/vacum would probably dragged the other ship down/capsize
+ obviously the speed issue






Si

[Edited by super_si - 11/20/2002 10:41:12 AM]

father_jack

Sod the seagulls, just think of all that lovely oil going to waste.

super_si

Video

Si

David Lock

AFAIK the Spanish Authorities wouldn't let the salvage company tow her into a local port where it could probably have been sorted. So instead she was dragged out into heavy seas to go eleswhere and broke in two. DL

Dave P

According to the Uk Sea Lord (or whatever the head navy honcho) we have the second largest Navy in the world only behind the US in size.

Unfortunately most of our sailors are doubling up as firman so are on standby for Friday.

Dave

Dave T-S

Normal Scoobynet disinformation being bandied around

Facts:

Your car runs on petrol.
Petrol is distilled from oil.
The Prestige was a single hull ship built in 1976.
The EU oil trade is the largest in the world - crude imports represent 27% of trade (USA 25%)
EU oil demand is 640 million tons PA.
90% of total oil trade with the EU is seaborne.
The average age of the world tanker fleet in 1999 was 18 years - 41% were over 20 years old. In tonnage terms that represented 36% of the total tanker tonnage.
EU tanker regulation is MARPOL 92. This states that existing carriers must comply with the double hull requirements not later than 30 years after their date of delivery.

USA OPA regulations are probably the strictest, and even after the Exxon Valdez disaster they are phased, in that single hull tankers will not be banned from US waters until 2010.

Summary:

Why can't you ban all single hull/over 15 year old tankers from EU waters now?

Simple - a large chunk of the fleet would have to be scrapped, and you wouldn't have any petrol to put in your Imprezas.

Like it or not, the world runs on oil (remember the petrol tanker strikes?) and it's an economic issue.

[Edited by Dave T-S - 11/20/2002 2:37:03 PM]

JamieMacdonald

It's all about the Benjamins...

Nick VR4

Spain is facing an environmental time bomb, with fears growing that it is only a matter of time before millions of gallons of fuel oil trapped in a sunken tanker leaks out. Salvage experts say it is unlikely that an estimated 70,000 tonnes of oil aboard the Bahamas-registered Prestige could ever be recovered.

The giant tanker is resting two miles beneath the Atlantic Ocean's surface around 150 miles off Spain's north-west coast.

Environmentalists fear that unless the oil is salvaged, it will eventually leak out and spark the worst ecological disaster in history.

'Difficult'

But Lars Walder, of Dutch-based company Smit, which led the salvage operation, believed recovering the oil may be impossible.

And he doubted that any company other than his had the specialist equipment capable of drilling into the tanks and removing the oil.

He said: "Pumping out oil from such a depth has never been done and I think it is unlikely the decision will ever be taken to try.

"We have successfully pumped from 2.5km (1.5 miles) and it may be possible to go to 3.5km (2.1 miles) but it would be very difficult.

Anxious wait

"Also, the oil will be very thick because of the cold temperatures on the ocean floor and we would have to pump hot water down to heat and thin it.

"I do not think we are going to do that work."

The news will leave conservationists and Spanish and Portuguese authorities, whose coastlines would suffer, with an anxious wait to see if the tanker breaks up further.

Gradual corrosion could release the oil in months or years to come.

Restrictions

If all the remaining 70,000-plus tonnes of oil were to pollute the waters and coastline, the slick could be almost twice the size of the Exxon Valdez spill off Alaska in 1989.

Work was continuing on Spain's Galician shores to rescue hundreds of birds and clean up the 6,000 tonnes of oil that leaked out before the tanker sank on Tuesday afternoon.

Political pressure was mounting to speed up restrictions on tanker movements and a European ban on single hull tankers like the Prestige

super_si

Building Exxon Valdez , its huge

[Edited by super_si - 11/20/2002 4:02:14 PM]

Dave T-S

The seaborne movement of oil products is an inherently dangerous activity....but whilst the world needs oil it will continue.

Whenever there is a large oil spill the hysterical voices always call for a ban on tankers in their waters....but how much oil does Spain consume, and how much does it produce; oh, and how much does Spain itself pollute the Mediterranean with industrial waste and sewage

I do not think people realise the sheer size of the world's tanker tonnage - the world oil tanker fleet on 01 Jan 99 comprised 7030 ships totalling 290 million tons tdwt. 104m tons, or probably around 2500 ships, of this was over 20 years old!! You can't just scrap these overnight, and in any case the vast majority were built to the standards in force at the time.

Incidentally, 80% of shipping accidents are as the result of human error....

MarkO

On a similar note..

Anyone see the programme recently about freak waves? Very interesting...

JamieMacdonald

So are modern ships built to a higher standard, i.e. not susceptible to snapping in half?

J

Nick VR4

Yes better spec more strengh etc
But watching the programme on waves nothing would stand up to them
a wall of water 100ft high SCARY

AlexM

I saw it..

It turns out that recent research has shown that freak waves occur much,much more often than previously thought.

A freak wave can top 35 metres in height, and can exert a force of 100 tons / sq m on the structure of a ship, which is sufficient to punch straight through the hull (they are designed to resist 20 ton / sq m, and might hold as much as 40 with damage.

Another structural expert on the news said that it was quite common for waves to open holes in the sides of a ship. Given this, a single hulled tanker would seem not to be the best idea.

AlexM

Older ships are more susceptible to loss because of accident damage, inferior design, corrosion and metal fatigue.

Modern ships can break in half too though.

JamieMacdonald

Can't the tankers go round the big waves, or don't they corner very well?

So unless the ships can avoid big waves, there will always be a chance that this is going to happen?

[Edited by JamieMacdonald - 11/20/2002 5:55:48 PM]

DJFish

Chance of a freak wave (according to the 'experts') is so slim that they just build vessels to an internationally agreed standard for the worst weather the ship can expect to encounter in it's 'normal' life.

Everything get's old and breaks eventually, the reason these old sh1theaps are still in use is 'cos they're cheaper to charter than a new shiney double bottomed one, same reason minicab drivers use Rover 820i's. 'cos at the end of the day, we all want to pay less for our petrol and the oil companies want a maximum profit.

There are thousands of properly maintained and well crewed ships currently afloat and then there are the ones which are flagged out and owned, operated and crewed by *****, but at the end of the day, the wrong sequence of events could sink any of them.

Makes me glad I now steer a desk.

Regarding tanker manouverability characteristics........a scoob would still have it in the twisties

Dave

MarkO

That's the reason I mentioned the program. Apparently, according to the latest research, freak or rogue waves are far more common than previously predicted under the old mathematical models....

Check it out, here.

[Edited by MarkO - 11/20/2002 6:36:01 PM]

DJFish

Annoyed me slightly when you have the skipper of the QE2 saying "yes I've seen one", then some desk jockey saying "nope they don't exist and anyone who says they've seen one is a liar"

I know who I'd rather trust (Clue: the bloke with the beard!)

Dave

ps. I saw a freak wave, he then proceeded to dangle his kid off a balcony!!

(can't believe I'm the first to do that one!)

MarkO

Taxi!!!

ChristianR

iTrader: (1)

I found that program about freak waves very interesting, and the sheer power of the wave is very alarming!

On another note, the link Si did to the video of the oil tanker sinking (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...&cid=968&/all/), have you listened to the blokes’ voice that is doing the commentary?

How unenthusiastic do you want to get!!

Dave T-S

Jamie
For a VLCC, it's about two or three miles to turn or do an amergency stop from full speed.......

The problem with the freak waves is you get no advance warning of their approach.

super_si

Id seen a couple on Discovery channel before, like the raising current tipping barges etc