Time bomb off Coast of Death
More than 10,000 tonnes of heavy fuel oil have leaked from the broken hull of the tanker and efforts of salvage crews to prevent the remaining 70,000 tonnes escaping now appear hopeless.
Thousands of marine creatures have perished on a blackened eight-mile stretch of Spain’s Coast of Death and concerns now centre on where else the oil will come ashore.
The six-mile long slick was moving toward the Spanish coast yesterday at a speed of one mph, said Portuguese Navy commander Augusto Ezequiel.
Portugal is also close to the firing line but coastal communities in other European countries, including Ireland, are on high alert amidst fears that unfavourable winds could bring ashore an ecological disaster.
Marine Minister Dermot Ahern said the Irish Coast Guard were assessing the risk to Ireland and were in close contact with their Spanish counterparts who were using satellite imaging to track the movement of the oil.
He said current indications based on historical wind patterns in the vicinity of the tanker were that the Irish coast would be spared, but added it would continue to be closely monitored.
Several EU member states are at loggerheads over the handling of the disaster which was first signalled a week ago today when the 26-year-old Bahamas-registered Prestige put out distress calls after listing to one side in rough seas off the Galician coast of north-west Spain.
The ship stated it was en route to the British territory of Gibraltar but Britain said its ultimate destination was Singapore and refused to take responsibility for it while Portugal also refused to allow the ship into its waters.
After several days of being towed about by rescuers, the single hull designed vessel, due to be outlawed by the EU in 2005, broke in two yesterday morning 100 miles from Spain and by afternoon had all but disappeared beneath the waves.
The cargo on board the Prestige equates to over 20 million gallons of dense oil, or enough to fill 45 Olympic sized swimming pools, and the implications for fisheries, wildlife and recreation are enormous.
“Heavy oil is less likely to be broken up by the wave action so it will be travelling further distances in the sea,” said Dr Tony Lewis of the Marine Research Centre at University College Cork. “If a wind is blowing from the south-west then certainly the oil will head in our direction.”
Joe Maddock, chairman of the Irish Fishermen’s Organisation, said the slick would have serious implications for the country’s 100m mariculture industry if it reached Irish shores.
“It would have a devastating effect on fish farms along the coast, particularly around Dungarvan Bay and Bantry Bay. Even if it settles on the seabed, it could destroy prawn and mussel beds or get into trawler nets,” he warned.
The last big spill to affect Ireland was in 1996 when the Sea Empress was holed off Wales, releasing 70,000 tonnes of light oil which began arriving in Wexford weeks later and left a clean-up operation cost of €200,000.
Karin Dubsky, of the Irish-based organisation Coastwatch Europe, appealed for an action plan to be put in place to head off any pollution threat.
“It’s a long way off but it’s a huge quantity and it’s much more difficult to disperse. Our bays and inlets could be protected by floating booms and where they exist, by closing sluice gates,” she said. “We usually just wait until it happens. We should be in a state of readiness.”
