Sea Prince
On 23 July 1995, the oil tanker the Sea Prince was travelling from
Saudi Arabia partially loaded with 85,000 tonnes of Arabian crude
when it grounded as it attempting to move away from the port of
Yosu to a safety bay to shelter from the coming typhoon. A fire
broke out in the engine room. The incident caused a spill of around
5,000 tonnes of oil.
The spill affected the shoreline of the Korean islands, the southern
and eastern Korean peninsula and certain Japanese islands. In all,
73 km of coastline were affected by the pollution, Sorido Island
being the worst hit.
On
the 24th, the fire was put out and almost all of the oil
remaining in the tanks was transferred into barges. When
the weather conditions improved, a boom was deployed around
the vessel and recovery operations were able to begin on
the 25th. As many as 500 vessels, including many fishing
boats, were mobilised to respond to the pollution, but recovery
proved difficult due to the extensive spreading of the pollutant.
In addition to recovery, dispersants were spread by aircraft.
Response operations at sea lasted 19 days.
Once
the lightering and recovery operations were finished, the
Sea Prince was successfully refloated and towed outside
of Korean waters, but sank during towing.
On
land, mechanical means were deployed in the most polluted
areas to remove large accumulations of oil (skimming and
pumping). Elsewhere, the oil was recovered manually. By
the end of October, clean-up was complete, except near where
the vessel grounded, where response operations continued
until July 1996. The buried oil detected was removed in
October 1996.
ITOPF
called upon an intervention team from Cedre, on behalf of
the UK P&I Club and the IOPC Funds, to participate in
assessing the extent of the pollution and damages. The accident
area is home to intensive aquaculture and fishing activities,
which were affected to varying extents by the pollution.
Two experts from Cedre were sent on site, including a specialist
in damages to aquaculture. The two agents conducted, in
collaboration with the Koreans, an inventory of the many
aquaculture installations affected by the spill. Samples
were taken for organoleptic testing and chemical analysis,
and tests were carried out in the United Kingdom.
This
incident constitutes one of the major spills involving the
IOPC Funds. Compensation by the IOPC Funds for this spill
totalled 48 million US Dollars.
Name: Sea Prince
Date: 23 July 1995
Location: Republic of Korea
Accident area: Yosu
Cause of spill: grounding
Product transported: Saudi Arabian crude oil
Quantity transported: 85,000 tonnes
Quantity spilled: 5,000 tonnes
Ship type: oil tanker
Flag: Cypriot
The Sea Prince grounded (Source: Cedre)
Last update: 11 December 2007