Massive Oil Spill News

Spain on Monday won backing from Europe's top court in its mutlimillion euros damage claim against The London Steam-Ship Owners Mutual Insurance Association for a massive oil spill on its northwestern coast two decades ago.The 2002 sinking of the Greek oil tanker Prestige, which was sailing to Gibraltar, released an estimated 63,000 tones of foul-smelling black fuel along the Galicia coast and forced the closure of Spain's richest fishing grounds.It led to a lengthy dispute between The London Steam-Ship Owners' Mutual Insurance Association Limited…

The clean-up of a massive oil spill in August from a vessel off Mauritius will likely be mostly completed by January, the bulk carrier's owner, Japan's Nagashiki Shipping, said on Thursday.Of the roughly 1,000 tonnes that spilled from the Panamanian-flagged MV Wakashio, all of the oil that had been floating in the ocean had been recovered, Nagashiki Shipping said in a statement.Work to remove the oil along approximately 30 km (18.6 miles) of coastline was proceeding smoothly and would likely be completed by January…

In the first issue its 'Perspectives' online magazine DNV GL’s Graham Bennett points out that the Macondo incident has cast a spotlight on well control standards and the need for more consistency in training. Offshore oil and gas activities are not, by nature, inherently safe. They involve handling large amounts of pressurised hydrocarbons and other produced fluids and gases. The industry has been improving its process safety performance ever since the Piper Alpha platform incident, in which 167 men died in 1988, but it still has far to go in effectively managing major hazard risks. Many elements behind the fire, fatalities and massive oil spill from the Macondo field in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 had been seen before.

Atlantic Coast Marine Group, Inc. successfully responds to World War II era motor tanker leaking massive cargo of oil into the Atlantic Ocean's waters. Beaufort, North Carolina-based Atlantic Coast Marine Group, Inc. (ACMG), a marine salvage, emergency towing and environmental services provider, was recently contracted to provide an initial survey and fast response pollution mitigation to a World War II era vessel believed to be the SS W.E. Hutton. As ACMG explained, motor tanker W.E.

The U.S. Chemical Safety Board is in disarray and has struggled to finish investigations into serious accidents at chemical plants and refineries that in one case killed seven people, according to a draft report by two Congressional committees. The report, prepared by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform and the Committee on Science, Space and Technology, said CSB Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso and two other officials have created an "abusive and hostile work environment" at the board's offices. The report, seen by Reuters, will be issued later Thursday. As a result, experienced investigators have left, according to the report, and delayed probes such as the one into the 2010 explosion at Tesoro Petroleum Corp's refinery in Anacortes, Washington, that killed seven.

The government has a plan for responding to your oil spill. Do you? In February, due to a collision between a tug boat and a tank barge, approximately 31,500 gallons of crude oil were released into the Mississippi River. The Mississippi River was closed down for two days and the residents of St. Charles Parish sat on pins and needles, waiting to find out if their drinking water would be contaminated. Thankfully, the drinking water was not affected, there were no reports of serious environmental damage and the River re-opened several days after the closure. It doesn’t always and happily, however. Unfortunately, the potential for a spill like this is always present when operating vessels.

Not long after specialized tank ships were developed, enabling the carriage of large quantities of oil and petroleum products, groundings, collisions, and other casualties started causing significant oil spills. In those early days, there was no financial incentive to clean up such spills. To the extent that there was a response, it was often by Good Samaritans, a term derived from a parable found in the Bible at Luke 10:25-37 about a stranger from Samaria who, with no thought of reward, came to the aid of an injured robbery victim in Judah.

The April 2010 Gulf of Mexico massive oil spill needed immediate external support, expertise, solutions and equipment to assist in the containment and clean-up efforts. Finnish based Lamor Corporation immediately set its action plans into motion and within 36 hours, through its global network, the company airlifted its arsenal of equipment and key personnel to the scene. The blown-out well on the ocean floor off Louisiana threatened the entire ecosystem in the area as well as the livelihoods of tens of thousands of people at a rate of over 5,000 barrels of leaking crude oil per day.

According to a June 10 report from the Associated Press, Bristow Group, which provides helicopter service to the offshore oil industry, said revenue from deep water drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico may slide as much as 85% by the end of June because of the six-month moratorium on deep water drilling in the Gulf. The company, which has large international operations, said that revenue from the Gulf generates about six percent of its operating income. Part of the loss of revenue is being offset by new work from oil company BP PLC, which is trying to contain a massive oil spill that prompted the moratorium. (Source: Associated Press)

California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. filed a lawsuit today on behalf of the California Department of Fish and Game Office of Spill Prevention and Response, State Lands Commission and State Water Boards against the owners, operators and pilot of the M/V Cosco Busan, the shipping vessel that spilled more than 53,000 gallons of oil into San Francisco Bay. “This was a preventable accident that had tragic consequences,” Attorney General Brown said. On November 7, 2007, the Cosco Busan, piloted by John Cota, hit the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge’s Delta Tower. The crash caused approximately 53,569 of gallons of oil to spew into San Francisco Bay and spread to the Pacific Ocean and along Bay Area shorelines.

The first of two coastal protection vessels has been delivered to Spain’s Maritime Safety Authority SASEMAR. The main role for 220-ton bollard pull Don Inda is emergency towing of a tanker, as it is equipped with a full range of equipment for recovering spilled oil. Rolls-Royce developed the UT 722 L design -- derived from the anchor handler of the same type number, although they differ from an offshore AHTS in many respects -- and provided the main equipment. Astilleros Zamakona, based at Santurce-Bilbao, built the vessels. The SASEMAR vessels have a large installed power and very powerful towing winches, but are flexible enough to take on many other roles including pollution clean-up, escort towing, rescue of ships and their crews, emergency co-ordination, firefighting and salvage.

According to Inq7.net, Philippine’s shipowners are asking for more time to replace their single-hull tankers with double-hull vessels because the capital and maintenance costs for the hardier vessels are higher. Single hull tankers, which are being phased out around the world, have become the subject of revived scrutiny in the country following the August 11 sinking of the weather-beaten MT Solar I off Guimaras Island. The sunken vessel unleashed a massive oil spill. Stakeholders in the shipping industry wanted the ban on single-hull vessels implemented in 2015. While some expect the ban to be enforced as early as 2008, others believe that more time will be required since shipowners are finding the transition from single-hull to double-hull too costly.

The Coast Guard and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources yesterday were racing against time to prevent a major environmental disaster as oil seeped from a tanker that sank between Guimaras and Negros Islands Friday. The spill is threatening marine life and the tourism industry of Western Visayas, officials said, and moving closer to Negros Occidental. The Coast Guard in Bacolod had a Marine Environment Protection Unit, assisted by trained personnel of oil firms in the province, on standby to set up spill booms in case the oil slick approaches Negros, to help prevent its entry into the area, Chief Petty Officer Cornelio Barbasa said.

Despite initial contentions that there were only two major oil spills in the wake of Katrina, details released by the U.S. Coast Guard indicate that the problem is much larger. According to the USCG, oil pollution containment and recovery operations continue in Southeast Louisiana resulting from the destructive force of Hurricane Katrina. The following information on each spill is current as of 5 p.m., September 15. Bass Enterprises Production Company – Cox Bay, La., near mile marker 35 Mississippi River· The product at the Bass Enterprises Production Company Cox Bay Facility is contained mechanically and naturally and is being recovered and pumped into barges for transport to reclamation facilities.