Prestige: European Community Involvement
Immediately
after the casualty was reported, a full complement of manpower and
resources was made available to the French, Spanish and Portuguese
authorities...
The Prestige incident occurred on 13 November 2002 as the 26 year old tanker, flying the Bahamas flag with a Liberian crew, carrying 77000 tonnes of heavy FO sustained hull damage and sprang a leak offshore Galicia. The tanker finally broke up on 19 November 2002 and sank 270 kms off the Spanish coast.
From the outset, the Commission was in close contact with the Spanish authorities and the Commissions Civil Protection Unit provided regular situation updates to competent national authorities of member states as well as inside the Commission.
After receiving requests from Spain, Portugal and France the Community Civil Protection Mechanism sent out eight different requests for assistance for dedicated response vessels, planes, equipment and experts to combat the spill.
The first request was sent out on 14 November 2002 and the last one was sent out on 9 January 2003. Immediately after the casualty was reported, a full complement of manpower and resources was made available to the French, Spanish and Portuguese authorities. France, the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Norway and Denmark sent their dedicated pollution response vessels.
Pollution
in Muxia village in November 2002. (Source: Cedre)
Cape Finisterre beach in November 2002. (Source: Cedre)
Furthermore, in the space of days, a considerable amount of booms was made available to the Spanish authorities (20 kilometres). From 17 November to 2 December and in co-ordination with the Spanish authorities, the Commissions Information and Monitoring Centre acquired satellite imagery of the area as part of the provisions of the International Charter on Space and Major Catastrophes.
Subsequently, the Commission’s Joint Research Centre at Ispra conducted an initial analysis of the imagery. In conjunction with the Spanish authorities, the Commission organised a field trip for observers from most member states to visit Galicia from 24 to 27 November 2002. They were government experts and were able to acquire first hand experience for this type of emergency situation.
The Commission offered to send a Co-ordination and Assessment Team made up of experts made available by member states but the Spanish authorities declined the offer. The team’s remit would have been to handle specific problems defined by the Spanish authorities such as high sea response, onshore response, assessment of cleaning techniques. Furthermore the Commission offered to send a panel of European experts to assist the Spanish Scientific Committee in charge of dealing with the wreck. After the spill and response operation were over the Commission offered to co-fund the Environmental impact and assessment Programme conducted by the Spanish authorities in Galicia with a view to assessing preventive and response measures implemented during the clean-up operation. This assessment was not conducted.
Last update: April 2004