CHENNAI: Yet another angle of negligence and mismanagement by Kamarajar Port of one of the worst oil spills along Chennai shores came to light on Friday. The Indian Coast Guard claimed that they were informed of the accident that led to the oil spill only three hours later.
Indian Coast Guard Regional Commander Inspector General Rajan Bargotra said that they were informed about the incident only after 6.30 am following which the first sortie was carried around 7.30 am. The accident took place at around 4 am. However, a top Kamarajar Port official denied the allegation.
“The first signal station concentrated on safeguarding the ship. We tried some numbers but could not reach earlier. But this delay is negligible taking the ground reality into account in such a scene,” said the port official.
Isle of Man flagship vessel B W Maple was carrying 27,500 metric tonnes of LPG while MT Dawn Kancheepuram was carrying 32,800 tonnes of motor spirit. Both the cargoes were highly inflammable and our focus was on finding out whether there was any loss of life or possible threat to the vessels, said the Port official.
Whatever the case, the delay in ticking off the Coast Guard early resulted in loss of valuable three hours during which time the furnace oil and sludge from MT Dawn Kancheepuram leaked into the sea.
“We were unaware about the seepage of oil when the collision happened. It was totally dark and we were caught unaware. It was only after the daybreak that we noticed the sheen of oil through the Vessel Traffic Management System,” said another port official.
Captain M A Pillai, sailing master mariner with 30 years experience on foreign going vessels trading worldwide, says that the ship’s captain should have sent an initial notification to Kamarajar Port. This notification should have gone immediately to Indian Coast Guard.
Pillai also feels that Coast Guard should have called for the International Association of Classification to which the vessel belongs and they should have analysed the damage. “This was not done by Coast Guard,” he said. Meanwhile, an FIR has been registered by Minjur police in this regard.