Cape Town Harbor News

South Africa banned all passenger vessels from its ports on Wednesday due to the coronavirus outbreak, leaving tourists on a cruise ship docked in Cape Town in limbo following tests for possible COVID-19 cases on board.The MV AidAmira's more than 1,700 passengers and crew have been unable to leave the ship since Monday, after a crew member on a cargo ship who shared a plane with six passengers on the liner showed symptoms of the coronavirus.Port authorities quarantined the Italian-flagged AidAmira while the six passengers were tested for coronavirus.All those tests came back negative, South Af

Maritime charity, the Apostleship of the Sea has called for a major change in the way seafarers and fishermen are treated by government authorities when they are the victims of unscrupulous owners. The recent case of 75 Indonesian fishermen illustrates what the Apostleship of the Sea says is a heavy-handed and ill thought out process. Local media have reported on the slave-like conditions endured by the 75 Indonesian fishermen stranded in Cape Town harbor for the last month. Many of the crew had not been paid for two years by the Taiwanese owners and were forced to continue to work…

The world's biggest floating diamond processing vessel will set sail for the first time within three weeks and should be in position off Namibia before Christmas, the Namibian Minerals Corporation (NAMCO) said. "This is the biggest offshore diamond processing plant in the world," NAMCO chairman Alastair Holberton told reporters on a tour of the ship in Cape Town harbor. "We expect that in its first work up year in operation it will harvest 200,000 carats of diamonds worth about $30 million," he added. Geologists estimate that up to three billion carats of diamonds lie off the Namibian and South African coasts. NAMCO has four mining vessels, including the new vessel, MV Ya Toivo, to comb the sea bed. Holberton said the latest project had cost NAMCO 200 million rand ($25.71 million).