Oil Tanker Runs Aground in Mauritius - Oil Spill

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

22 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Remember the days when sailors could actually sail and determine their position without GPS?

Fortunately we are past that nasty little bit of Luddite life.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

9 minutes ago, Jay McKinsey said:

Fortunately we are past that nasty little bit of Luddite life.

Right up to the point where GPS fails and a ship hits a reef or runs aground...🤔

Similar to being able to actually read a map when the battery in your handphone dies when you are on the bike and you can’t access your GPS.

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

4 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Right up to the point where GPS fails and a ship hits a reef or runs aground...🤔

Similar to being able to actually read a map when the battery in your handphone dies when you are on the bike and you can’t access your GPS.

Many, many, many more groundings occurred during the days of celestial navigation. If you are referring to the Mauritius grounding, do you have any evidence that it was caused by a failed GPS?

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

The 58-year-old captain of the ill-fated newcastlemax Wakashio could face negligence charges after it emerged the crew were celebrating a crewmember’s birthday and had headed nearer towards the Mauritius coastline to get a wifi signal just prior to the bulk carrier’s grounding on a reef off the island’s south coast.

The bombshell revelations – first reported by local newspaper L’Express – come from investigators who have interviewed the crew of the Japanese-owned, Panamanian-flagged ship.https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2020/08/mauritius-oil-spill-tragedy-how-why-the-mv-wakashio-ran-aground-and-aftermath.html

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

Just now, Jay McKinsey said:

Many, many, many more groundings occurred during the days of celestial navigation. If you are referring to the Mauritius grounding, do you have any evidence that it was caused by a failed GPS?

I am not saying that GPS is less accurate than celestial navigation, I am simply pointing out that perhaps sailors should have a ‘back-up plan’ and be required to be able to use a sextant in the event that the GPS fails.

I did not refer to the incident in Mauritius in my previous comment, but onviously something went wrong. Reefs do not move and known reefs are indicated on a map.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

4 minutes ago, Jay McKinsey said:

The 58-year-old captain of the ill-fated newcastlemax Wakashio could face negligence charges after it emerged the crew were celebrating a crewmember’s birthday and had headed nearer towards the Mauritius coastline to get a wifi signal just prior to the bulk carrier’s grounding on a reef off the island’s south coast.

The bombshell revelations – first reported by local newspaper L’Express – come from investigators who have interviewed the crew of the Japanese-owned, Panamanian-flagged ship.https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2020/08/mauritius-oil-spill-tragedy-how-why-the-mv-wakashio-ran-aground-and-aftermath.html

This remains to be proven. Furthermore, the position of the ship in relation to the reef should have been known at all times.

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

Just now, Douglas Buckland said:

This remains to be proven. Furthermore, the position of the ship in relation to the reef should have been known at all times.

Well it certainly remains to be proven that the GPS failed! My search didn't return a single accusation of such other than yours. Yes the position should have been known but they decided to party instead and get as close as they could. Article says the coast guard was watching their collision course with the reef and tried to reach them but they didn't answer until a minute before impact. This kind of behavior has precedence in the Costa Concordia which did something similar. 

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

For Heaven’s sake! I never said the GPS failed in this case, I made a theoretical statement that GPS COULD fail resulting on a ship stranded on a reef!

Getting your knickers in a twist and taking a comment out of context to further your narrative is childish in the extreme.

[Yoshiro Kamamura + 274]

On 8/20/2020 at 4:40 AM, Jay McKinsey said:

The 58-year-old captain of the ill-fated newcastlemax Wakashio could face negligence charges after it emerged the crew were celebrating a crewmember’s birthday and had headed nearer towards the Mauritius coastline to get a wifi signal just prior to the bulk carrier’s grounding on a reef off the island’s south coast.

The bombshell revelations – first reported by local newspaper L’Express – come from investigators who have interviewed the crew of the Japanese-owned, Panamanian-flagged ship.https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2020/08/mauritius-oil-spill-tragedy-how-why-the-mv-wakashio-ran-aground-and-aftermath.html

Are you sure? Something tells me it's a covert operation of librul media and "greenies" to discredit the godly work of our oil and coal lobbies. Japanese are so responsible and duty-driven, surely and old captain would never change the course just to catch a wi-fi signal. 

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

14 hours ago, Yoshiro Kamamura said:

Are you sure? Something tells me it's a covert operation of librul media and "greenies" to discredit the godly work of our oil and coal lobbies. Japanese are so responsible and duty-driven, surely and old captain would never change the course just to catch a wi-fi signal. 

Your conclusion fails to grasp the realitis of the global narcotics trade.  That bulk freighter was carring contgraband from Asia, for off-loading into small boats at Mauritius.  Normally, the ocean traffic passes well clear; the turn waypoint is over 50 miles off the coast.  The auto-pilot on the ship was re-set in order to bring this ship in closer so that the dope could be off-loaded.  Mauritius has a ruling group that, while nominally democratic, in fact operates as a drug cabal.  The off-loaded drugs are under govt protection as they are moved further to market, into Africa and eventually to Europe.  The whole story about the birthday party and the wi-fi is a complete distraction, manufactured for public consumption (and to make sure that the insurers paid for the wreck and its removal).   Sorry you do not understand that.

@Jay McKinsey

@Douglas Buckland

@Dan Warnick

Normally a ship like this would be salvaged and welded back together again.  What works against this is that the ship is now 13 years old.  At 15 years the ship requires the equivalent of an aircraft "C"-check, an expensive drydock overhaul.  Then it needs further expensive drydocks every 2-1/2 years in order to be in compliance.  Since this ship was close to the C-check age, it made more economic sense to scrap it. 

Usually the ship would be towed or sent to a scrapping beach in Pakistan, India, or Bangladesh.  There the ship would be cut up and the steel plate re-sold.  The traditional market for ship steel scrap is China, where it is (was) melted down for constgruction re-bar.  That market, a function of the Chinese concrete building programs, has largely collapsed.  Without a profitable market for the steel, not much point in towing the wreck across the Indian Ocean behind a deep-sea tug to sell it at a loss.  So the section was sunk. 

The engine section was eminently salvagable.  You do that by bringing in air compressors and pressurizing the bottom cavities where the belly plates are holed. But that pushes out even more trapped oil, so they cannot do that in this case.  Then the alternative is to bring in what are known as "air bags," basically pontoons made of rubberized canvas.  These lifting bags are secured to hefty cables passed under the hull, then the bags are inflated with air and the wreck is lifted off.  You would likely not get enough water displacement in this case so some of the reef would have to be demolished underneath the hull.  The govt does not want that, so now the ship will be sawed up on-site, by first removing the upper structure and putting those sections on a barge, then dismantling the big engine and pulling that out, then a huge crane of easily 1,000 tons lift to pull the remainder.  It is an expensive exercise.  Only insurers do that; typically such ships are put into single-vessel corporat shells under flags of convenience, i.e. Libya, Liberia, Marshall Islands, Malta, Panama, and then the wreck is abandoned and the company dissolved.  That leaves the owners free without a drain on their pocketbook. 

If the final sections are too hefty for the big crane, then it is cut up using a cable with diamond fragments embedded.  That cuts through the steel plates and severs the parts.  The cable is rocked back and forth underneath the wreck while maintaining upward pressure for contact, and the plates are sawn through from bottom to top.  Don't put your fingers in there. 

The local authorities did nothing at first after the grounding, so that the local skiffs could unload the dope.  Trust this explains. 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

3 hours ago, Jan van Eck said:

Your conclusion fails to grasp the realitis of the global narcotics trade.  That bulk freighter was carring contgraband from Asia, for off-loading into small boats at Mauritius.  Normally, the ocean traffic passes well clear; the turn waypoint is over 50 miles off the coast.  The auto-pilot on the ship was re-set in order to bring this ship in closer so that the dope could be off-loaded.  Mauritius has a ruling group that, while nominally democratic, in fact operates as a drug cabal.  The off-loaded drugs are under govt protection as they are moved further to market, into Africa and eventually to Europe.  The whole story about the birthday party and the wi-fi is a complete distraction, manufactured for public consumption (and to make sure that the insurers paid for the wreck and its removal).   Sorry you do not understand that.

@Jay McKinsey

@Douglas Buckland

@Dan Warnick

Normally a ship like this would be salvaged and welded back together again.  What works against this is that the ship is now 13 years old.  At 15 years the ship requires the equivalent of an aircraft "C"-check, an expensive drydock overhaul.  Then it needs further expensive drydocks every 2-1/2 years in order to be in compliance.  Since this ship was close to the C-check age, it made more economic sense to scrap it. 

Usually the ship would be towed or sent to a scrapping beach in Pakistan, India, or Bangladesh.  There the ship would be cut up and the steel plate re-sold.  The traditional market for ship steel scrap is China, where it is (was) melted down for constgruction re-bar.  That market, a function of the Chinese concrete building programs, has largely collapsed.  Without a profitable market for the steel, not much point in towing the wreck across the Indian Ocean behind a deep-sea tug to sell it at a loss.  So the section was sunk. 

The engine section was eminently salvagable.  You do that by bringing in air compressors and pressurizing the bottom cavities where the belly plates are holed. But that pushes out even more trapped oil, so they cannot do that in this case.  Then the alternative is to bring in what are known as "air bags," basically pontoons made of rubberized canvas.  These lifting bags are secured to hefty cables passed under the hull, then the bags are inflated with air and the wreck is lifted off.  You would likely not get enough water displacement in this case so some of the reef would have to be demolished underneath the hull.  The govt does not want that, so now the ship will be sawed up on-site, by first removing the upper structure and putting those sections on a barge, then dismantling the big engine and pulling that out, then a huge crane of easily 1,000 tons lift to pull the remainder.  It is an expensive exercise.  Only insurers do that; typically such ships are put into single-vessel corporat shells under flags of convenience, i.e. Libya, Liberia, Marshall Islands, Malta, Panama, and then the wreck is abandoned and the company dissolved.  That leaves the owners free without a drain on their pocketbook. 

If the final sections are too hefty for the big crane, then it is cut up using a cable with diamond fragments embedded.  That cuts through the steel plates and severs the parts.  The cable is rocked back and forth underneath the wreck while maintaining upward pressure for contact, and the plates are sawn through from bottom to top.  Don't put your fingers in there. 

The local authorities did nothing at first after the grounding, so that the local skiffs could unload the dope.  Trust this explains. 

Aaah.  Like a breath of fresh air.  You should be Paul Harvey's replacement:  "And now you know the REST of the story".  Welcome back.

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

3 minutes ago, Dan Warnick said:

Aaah.  Like a breath of fresh air.  You should be Paul Harvey's replacement:  "And now you know the REST of the story".  Welcome back.

I am not "back."  I managed to slip in through a back-door.  I anticipate Selvedina will be deleting this post shortly, assuming she is true to form. Selvedina is my gate-keeper, and Nothing I would write passes her.  So, No, I am Not back.  All that asid, I was charmed by the naivety displayed on this marine episode, you guys are oblivious to what really goes on out there and how ugly the narcotics trade really is.  So I made the effort to set the record straight.  No, not a faulty GPS; deliberate steering to just off-shore, and it screwed up in the dark.  Cheers. 

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

11 minutes ago, Jan van Eck said:

I am not "back."  I managed to slip in through a back-door.  I anticipate Selvedina will be deleting this post shortly, assuming she is true to form. Selvedina is my gate-keeper, and Nothing I would write passes her.  So, No, I am Not back.  All that asid, I was charmed by the naivety displayed on this marine episode, you guys are oblivious to what really goes on out there and how ugly the narcotics trade really is.  So I made the effort to set the record straight.  No, not a faulty GPS; deliberate steering to just off-shore, and it screwed up in the dark.  Cheers. 

Quoting you so the delete gets harder. 😎

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

On 8/30/2020 at 7:10 AM, Jan van Eck said:

Your conclusion fails to grasp the realitis of the global narcotics trade.  That bulk freighter was carring contgraband from Asia, for off-loading into small boats at Mauritius.  Normally, the ocean traffic passes well clear; the turn waypoint is over 50 miles off the coast.  The auto-pilot on the ship was re-set in order to bring this ship in closer so that the dope could be off-loaded.  Mauritius has a ruling group that, while nominally democratic, in fact operates as a drug cabal.  The off-loaded drugs are under govt protection as they are moved further to market, into Africa and eventually to Europe.  The whole story about the birthday party and the wi-fi is a complete distraction, manufactured for public consumption (and to make sure that the insurers paid for the wreck and its removal).   Sorry you do not understand that.

@Jay McKinsey

@Douglas Buckland

@Dan Warnick

Normally a ship like this would be salvaged and welded back together again.  What works against this is that the ship is now 13 years old.  At 15 years the ship requires the equivalent of an aircraft "C"-check, an expensive drydock overhaul.  Then it needs further expensive drydocks every 2-1/2 years in order to be in compliance.  Since this ship was close to the C-check age, it made more economic sense to scrap it. 

Usually the ship would be towed or sent to a scrapping beach in Pakistan, India, or Bangladesh.  There the ship would be cut up and the steel plate re-sold.  The traditional market for ship steel scrap is China, where it is (was) melted down for constgruction re-bar.  That market, a function of the Chinese concrete building programs, has largely collapsed.  Without a profitable market for the steel, not much point in towing the wreck across the Indian Ocean behind a deep-sea tug to sell it at a loss.  So the section was sunk. 

The engine section was eminently salvagable.  You do that by bringing in air compressors and pressurizing the bottom cavities where the belly plates are holed. But that pushes out even more trapped oil, so they cannot do that in this case.  Then the alternative is to bring in what are known as "air bags," basically pontoons made of rubberized canvas.  These lifting bags are secured to hefty cables passed under the hull, then the bags are inflated with air and the wreck is lifted off.  You would likely not get enough water displacement in this case so some of the reef would have to be demolished underneath the hull.  The govt does not want that, so now the ship will be sawed up on-site, by first removing the upper structure and putting those sections on a barge, then dismantling the big engine and pulling that out, then a huge crane of easily 1,000 tons lift to pull the remainder.  It is an expensive exercise.  Only insurers do that; typically such ships are put into single-vessel corporat shells under flags of convenience, i.e. Libya, Liberia, Marshall Islands, Malta, Panama, and then the wreck is abandoned and the company dissolved.  That leaves the owners free without a drain on their pocketbook. 

If the final sections are too hefty for the big crane, then it is cut up using a cable with diamond fragments embedded.  That cuts through the steel plates and severs the parts.  The cable is rocked back and forth underneath the wreck while maintaining upward pressure for contact, and the plates are sawn through from bottom to top.  Don't put your fingers in there. 

The local authorities did nothing at first after the grounding, so that the local skiffs could unload the dope.  Trust this explains. 

A drug drop does make some sense.

[Zardoz + 5]

No Leak is good..but in the real world

 

Natural offshore seeps leak tons of oil every day – and have for thousands of years. Photo by Dave Valentine, University of California, Santa Barbara. ... Researchers found that natural offshore seeps near Goleta, California, alone have leaked up to 25 tons of oil each day – for the last several hundred thousand years.

In the Gulf of Mexico, there are more than 600 natural oil seeps that leak between one and five million barrels of oil per year, equivalent to roughly 80,000 to 200,000 tonnes. When a petroleum seep forms underwater it may form a peculiar type of volcano known as an asphalt volcano.

Microorganisms and phytoplankton appear to thrive in the waters around naturally occurring oil seeps on the Gulf floor. Natural oil seeps, as the one shown here, are plentiful in the Gulf of Mexico. Naturally seeping oil, in a small amounts, can actually contribute to growth in phytoplankton, according to researchers

 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

9 minutes ago, Zardoz said:

No Leak is good..but in the real world

 

Natural offshore seeps leak tons of oil every day – and have for thousands of years. Photo by Dave Valentine, University of California, Santa Barbara. ... Researchers found that natural offshore seeps near Goleta, California, alone have leaked up to 25 tons of oil each day – for the last several hundred thousand years.

In the Gulf of Mexico, there are more than 600 natural oil seeps that leak between one and five million barrels of oil per year, equivalent to roughly 80,000 to 200,000 tonnes. When a petroleum seep forms underwater it may form a peculiar type of volcano known as an asphalt volcano.

Microorganisms and phytoplankton appear to thrive in the waters around naturally occurring oil seeps on the Gulf floor. Natural oil seeps, as the one shown here, are plentiful in the Gulf of Mexico. Naturally seeping oil, in a small amounts, can actually contribute to growth in phytoplankton, according to researchers

 

 

This is the argument used by oil sands supporters.  "We are cleaning up a natural oil spill."

Yes, the Athabasca river erodes and some tar sands get released, but at very slow rates that nature can handle.

The natural process is absolutely nothing like the massive mines and tailing ponds you can see from space.

 

 

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,132]

2 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

This is the argument used by oil sands supporters.  "We are cleaning up a natural oil spill."

Yes, the Athabasca river erodes and some tar sands get released, but at very slow rates that nature can handle.

The natural process is absolutely nothing like the massive mines and tailing ponds you can see from space.

And like a good little authoritarian, you can't argue for your points of view so instead got a government job where you can impose your beliefs from the inside since no one believes your "science" << cough >> religion. 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

9 minutes ago, footeab@yahoo.com said:

And like a good little authoritarian, you can't argue for your points of view so instead got a government job where you can impose your beliefs from the inside since no one believes your "science" << cough >> religion. 

I argue my points of view well, but I never drafted any laws - only enforced them.

Yes, I am a science believer.  It may surprise you I am also saved and baptized and went to a private christian school for 3 years.

Yes, I got a government job saving the world from pollution.... how horrible.

Many people believe my science; numerous convictions were done using my data. Vast majority of companies just plead guilty after they got disclosure and could see my analytical reports.

This is what I did:

https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/environmental-enforcement/notifications.html

 

Edited September 2, 2020 by Enthalpic

[Yoshiro Kamamura + 274]

On 8/30/2020 at 3:10 PM, Jan van Eck said:

Your conclusion fails to grasp the realitis of the global narcotics trade.  That bulk freighter was carring contgraband from Asia, for off-loading into small boats at Mauritius.  Normally, the ocean traffic passes well clear; the turn waypoint is over 50 miles off the coast.  The auto-pilot on the ship was re-set in order to bring this ship in closer so that the dope could be off-loaded.  Mauritius has a ruling group that, while nominally democratic, in fact operates as a drug cabal.  The off-loaded drugs are under govt protection as they are moved further to market, into Africa and eventually to Europe.  The whole story about the birthday party and the wi-fi is a complete distraction, manufactured for public consumption (and to make sure that the insurers paid for the wreck and its removal).   Sorry you do not understand that.

How could anyone possibly understand without years of practice. Just like in the Garamond book publishing company from late Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum", there is always a gentleman with much wilder conspiration scheme already in the waiting room. We know that They know, but They know that we know that They know. Time is of the essence. Act, when Mars enters conjunction with Mercury. Details in Sunday's Gazzetta Segreta Dell'ermetismo, look for classifieds.