Oil Spill News

Salvage operations were in high-gear on Thursday to prevent a potential oil spill and pollution along South Africa's west coast from a grounded general cargo vessel, authorities said.The Panama-flagged "Ultra Galaxy" ran aground close to Doring Bay, some 300 km north of Cape Town, late on Tuesday after it started listing badly.

The removal of bulk oil from the sea and beaches in Singapore is nearly complete after the Singapore-flagged bunker vessel Marine Honour was hit by Netherlands-flagged dredger Vox Maxima on June 14.The Singapore MPA reports that there has been no observed oil slick along the East Coast and Changi since June 18 based on both satellite and drone images. The bulk of oil-soaked sand has been removed from most of the affected public beaches, with the exception of Tanjong and Palawan beach at Sentosa.

Singapore will seek compensation for the costs incurred in an oil spill last week from the owners of the stationary vessel that discharged the oil, local media CNA reported on Thursday.The Maritime and Port Authority told CNA that the shipowner of Singapore-flagged Marine Honour - which was hit by Netherlands-flagged dredger Vox Maxima - is liable for costs incurred in containing and cleaning the oil spill and damage to infrastructure.Reuters has reached out to the port authority for comment.Earlier…

The authorities in Singapore have started the next phase of an oil spill clean-up operation, caused by the allision of a dredger and a bunker vessel, with the additional deployment of various booms and oil recovery systems.The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) said that 1500 meters of booms have been deployed, and an additional 1600 meters will be deployed over the next few days in designated sites to support the containment of accumulated oil to facilitate the clean…

The authorities in Singapore have launched an oil spill clean-up operation after the Netherlands-flagged dredger Vox Maxima struck a stationary Singapore-flagged bunker vessel Marine Honour, causing a rupture of one its oil cargo tanks which released the low-sulphur fuel oil to the sea.Dredger Vox Maxima had reported a sudden loss in engine and steering control before its allision with bunker vessel Marine Honour on June 14, 2024.Investigations by the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) are ongoing…

An oil spill off southern Singapore has spread to other areas of the island's coast and is threatening a marine reserve, government agencies said, adding that authorities were intensifying efforts to mop up the fuel.The oil spilled into Singaporean waters after a Netherlands-flagged dredger struck a stationary Singapore-flagged bunker vessel on Friday afternoon in the southern port of Pasir Panjang. The dredger Vox Mariner had reported a sudden loss in engine and steering control before its allision with bunker vessel Marine Honour.

Authorities at the port of Antwerp have closed a dock and are using drones to monitor the fallout from an oil spill that occurred while a ship was bunkering at one of its docks, a port spokesperson said on Friday."We are doing everything we can to make sure the oil stays locally," the spokesperson said.Belgium's biggest port closed its Deurganck Dock as well as the Kieldrecht lock, the largest lock in the world when considering water volume, to prevent the spill's spread.The port spokesperson said 20 ships needed to be cleaned from the oil before they could leave the dock…

An oil spill from a runaway barge that struck a bridge near Galveston has been contained, the U.S. Coast Guard said on Thursday.At approximately 10 a.m. Wednesday, Martin Marine's barge MMLP 321 broke loose due to a break in the coupling and allided with the Pelican Island Causeway bridge, which connects Galveston Island and Pelican Island in Texas.There were no reports of injuries or any people in the water, officials said.One of the barge's cargo tanks became compromised as a result of the allision, causing an unknown quantity of vacuum gas oil to spill into the water.

A section of the busy Gulf Intercoastal Waterway has been closed to vessel traffic after a barge allided with a bridge that connects Galveston to Pelican Island, officials said on Wednesday.The U.S. Coast Guard said its watchstanders at Sector Houston-Galveston were notified of the allision at 9:50 a.m. and that the cause of the incident is under investigation. The barge, owned by Martin Petroleum, is believed to be a runaway that broke loose from a tow.There were no known injuries…

A barge that capsized in February and caused a large oil spill near Tobago that also affected neighboring Caribbean islands might have picked up the fuel from Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago's energy minister Stuart Young said on Monday."The vessels were on the way to Guyana," the minister said of a barge being towed by a tug boat while revealing the results of his government's investigation on the incident.The spill, previously identified by Trinidad's authorities as fuel oil, emerged from a capsized vessel first spotted by the country's Coast Guard on Feb.

The U.S. Coast Guard said one of its buoy tenders accidentally discharged approximately 500 gallons of diesel fuel 30 miles offshore of Fort Bragg, Calif., Friday morning.The vessel, USCGC Alder (WLB-216), was enroute to Humboldt Bay when the incident occurred, the Coast Guard said.Members of Coast Guard Sector San Francisco Incident Management Division notified interagency stakeholders and are investigating the oil spill and cause. They are also evaluating potential impacts to sensitive sites.

The U.S.

An oil leak from a barge carrying up to 35,000 barrels of fuel oil that capsized in early February off the Caribbean island of Tobago has stopped, said the twin islands' government on Thursday.The spill, which was first spotted off the coast of Tobago's Atlantic coast on Feb. 7, damaged some of the island's mangrove and threatened its tourism and fishing sector. The spill also entered the Caribbean Sea, threatening nearby Venezuela and Caribbean islands, including Bonaire."The hydrocarbon discharge emanating from the overturned vessel located off the coast of Tobago has stopped…

Oil stains possibly coming from neighboring Tobago have reached the island of Bonaire, local media said on Monday, prompting authorities to begin organizing protection to beaches and mangrove areas.Since an oil spill from a capsized vessel was first spotted by Trinidad and Tobago's Coast Guard on Feb. 7, it has blackened the Caribbean nation's beaches and is threatening other countries, including Grenada and Bonaire, whose main source of revenue is tourism.Part of Bonaire's East coast…

Trinidad and Tobago has hired two remediation and salvage firms to help clean up an ongoing oil spill off Tobago and salvage the leaking barge, the country's Ministry of Energy said on Tuesday.It has been almost two weeks since the oil spill was first discovered off Tobago's Atlantic coast after a barge ran aground on a reef. The spill has entered the Caribbean Sea, threatening nearby Venezuela and Grenada."An international partnership comprised of T&T Salvage LLC and QT Environmental Inc…

First responders and volunteers from Trinidad and Tobago on Tuesday sought to contain an oil spill detected last week in the Caribbean country's waters and clean areas of Tobago island's coast already affected by the incident.Trinidad and Tobago's coast guard first spotted the spill on Feb. 7, about 6 kilometers off the coast of Studley Park, the chief secretary of Tobago's national assembly, Farley Augustine, said in a press conference on Sunday.Barriers have been installed to contain the spill…

Lithuania said on Thursday it had been informed by a subsidiary of Polish oil refiner Orlen PKN of an oil spill in the country's waters in the Baltic Sea and had launched a probe into the incident.Lithuania's Environmental Protection Department said in a statement the subsidiary, Orlen Lietuva, had informed it on Wednesday of a 300-litre spill near the Butinge oil import terminal in connection with the loading of a tanker.It said an inspection by Lithuania later on Wednesday showed the spill measured nine kilometers by two kilometers with at least 1.8 tonnes of oil on the surface…

Predictability is the aim of every human, company, or society.Humanity simply strives to increase its level of predictability whether as a person, or as a group of people. When humans attain a certain level of predictability, their hope for the future goes up and their level of anxiety goes down.Oddly, conservatives and progressives both strive for predictability, they just do it in different ways. A conservative will say: If nothing changes, then my predictability for the future will go up.

The unified command consisting of the Coast Guard, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, New York City Department of Environmental Protection, New York City Office of Emergency Management, and Monmouth County Department of Health, received oil sample lab results from the Coast Guard Marine Safety Laboratory Friday, linking together oil spill cleanup efforts in both New York and New Jersey.Vane Brothers Company, as represented by Gallagher Marine Systems, has been identified as the responsible party.

Around 61,165 barrels of daily oil output from at least six producers, making up about 3% of crude oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, has been shut in by Third Coast Infrastructure's underwater pipeline leak, the U.S. Coast Guard said on Wednesday.The oil producers whose facilities are impacted include W&T Energy, Occidental Petroleum, Walter Oil and Gas, Cantium, Arena Offshore and Talos Energy Ventures, the Coast Guard said, citing the U.S. Interior Department's Bureau of…

The U.S. Coast Guard was leading an oil spill clean-up in the Gulf of Mexico on Friday, partnering with local and federal agencies and companies after a Main Pass Oil Gathering Co (MPOG) underwater pipeline began leaking.The crude oil pipeline is around 19 miles (30 km) offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, east of Venice, Louisiana, the U.S.

The maritime industry has seen a very long sequence of environmental regulations since the first implementation of MARPOL in the early 1970’s. All of these regulations have very much benefitted the ocean environment and also our industry to some degree. One of those regulations, OPA90, has had an outsized effect to an extent that it may no longer be as effective as it was in recent years due to its own success.Tanker oil spills in the United States have become so rare that people with actual U.S.

A U.S.-registered bulk carrier that spilled diesel fuel into Lake Michigan earlier this month is believed to have spilled approximately 1,500 gallons, the U.S. Coast Guard said on Monday.The 630-foot-long self-unloading bulk carrier Manitowoc was approximately 1.5 nautical miles offshore of Manistee, Mich. on August 2 when it reported it was leaking diesel fuel due to a hull breach on its starboard diesel tank. The investigation into the cause of the spill is ongoing.Prior to departing the Port of Manistee, the  vessel conducted and recorded initial tank soundings.