Self-Check Questions

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 470.

Fire

On 14 July 2012, a fire in hold 4 caused an explosion aboard MSC Flaminia while the ship was underway from Charleston, United States, to Antwerp, Belgium, forcing the crew to abandon the ship some 1,000 nautical miles from nearest land in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Her Majesty's Coastguard received a distress signal at 10:07 and broadcast an alert to all vessels in the area. DS Crown oil tanker en-route from Halifax was the first to arrive at the scene and rescue 22 crew members and two passengers from a lifeboat and a liferaft. One crewman remains missing and is presumed dead. The ship's First Officer died on DS Crown shortly after being taken aboard from burns he had sustained while fighting the fire. On 8 October, another seriously injured crew member of MSC Flaminia died in a speciality hospital for burn wounds in Portugal. A number of containers were also lost overboard. After the crew and passengers had abandoned the ship, MSC Flaminia was left drifting in mid-Atlantic. Dutch salvage company Smit International signed a salvage contract for the stricken vessel, but the extent of the fire was not known until the first salvage tug, Fairmount Expedition, arrived at the scene on 17 July.

According to the first reports, the fire was still ongoing in holds 4, 5 and 6, and the ship had developed a list of about 8.5 degrees as a result of the firefighting operations, but the engine room, superstructure and aftship were not seriously damaged. A second explosion occurred on board the stricken container ship on 18 July, but the salvage efforts were continued shortly thereafter. The ship's own firefighting system was also started and the salvage personnel attempted to find the missing crewman.

On 24 July, it was announced that the fire on board MSC Flaminia was under control and an aerial high definition video, recorded by a helicopter on 26 July, showed the damage to the ship and its containers. On 13 August, the salvage efforts continued again, but as no European country had given the ship a permission to enter its coastal area, MSC Flaminia remained at her waiting position approximately 240 nautical miles from the shore. In addition to extinguishing individual containers, the salvage crew had pumped water from the cargo holds in order to stabilize the vessel, reducing the list to around 2.5 degrees.

On 20 August 2012, five weeks after the crew abandoned the vessel, MSC Flaminia was given permission to enter German waters. After the ship had been towed to a sheltered anchorage off Heligoland, a team of experts entered the vessel and identified the possible hazards on board the stricken container ship. After the ship had been deemed safe, she was allowed to pass the English Channel and proceed to Jade Weser Port in Wilhelmshaven, Germany, where she arrived on 9 September 2012. The investigations are expected to take about one week, after which the unloading of the vessel may begin.

The fire onboard MSC Flaminia has again raised concerns about misdeclared cargo. Containers containing explosive or flammable materials are normally carried on the decks for safety reasons, but if the cargo manifest is incorrect or falsified, they might be stowed inside the cargo holds where they create a potential hazard. The shipping company has confirmed that according to the cargo manifest the ship was not carrying calcium hypochlorite, a chemical compound responsible for several container ship fires in the 1990s, in any of the 2,876 containers on board the ship, but due to the aforementioned reasons it can not be ruled out yet. Furthermore, the reluctance of any country to give permission for the ship to enter its coastal areas raised concerns about the vessel sinking or being intentionally scuttled in deep water. A similar situation resulted in a major oil spill in 2002 when the oil tanker Prestige broke in two and sank after French, Portuguese and Spanish governments refused to allow the ship to dock in their ports.

2 Answer the questions.

1. What was the reason of fire?

2. What were the Master's actions?

3. Was it possible to minimize losses?

4. Why was the vessel left drifting?

1. Why is the container inspection obligatory?

2. Why it is not possible to ignore minor damages of the container?

3. What is the size of a standart container?

4. What vessels can carry containers?

5. What is the hull of the container?

6. How are the containers secured aboard the ship?

7. What should be kept in mind before taking the cargo of containers?

8. How are usually containers damaged?

9. What is considered to be good contaner handling?

10. How can containers damages be reduced?