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OFFLOADING FSA SAFER TO COMMENCE 2023

The UN announced in November that the operation to unload the ‘FSO Safer’ of its 1.1m barrels of oil should begin in early 2023, and that the operation could take a total of 18 months.

The Saudi-backed Yemeni government and Iran-backed Houthi militias will later agree on the fate of the tanker after unloading it. The two sides will also agree on how to sell the crude oil on board.

The agreement to solve the problem of the FSO Safer and its oil, which has run since 2015, was achieved when it was agreed that the oil would be shifted to another, less decrepit, vessel, without any change to possession and ownership. The vessel is currently under the control of the Houthi rebel movement.

Emptying the supertanker is what primarily concerns the Maritime Affairs Authority and other concerned government agencies, such as the Public Authority for Environmental Protection. Clearing out the tanker will take place in the first few months of 2023.

The documents issued by the UN outline a proposal for the appointment of an international coordinator to oversee the unloading of the tanker. The process will depend on the success of the technical and safety measures for the workers that will carry out the operation.

The UN plan also highlights the importance of making sure that no elements of the armed conflict taking place in Yemen will pose a threat to those carrying out the operation.

However, the UN documents fail to mention the fate of the oil within the FSO Safer and how much of it will be sold after the operation is completed. It also fails to mention what will become of the dilapidated tanker.

The first step of the unloading plan will centre around evaluation, inspection, and the establishment of a safe working environment. After this, the oil cargo will be transferred onto another vessel.

The UN plan also outlines the need to seal off the tanker’s pipeline valves in order to prevent a spill during the transfer process, which will involve professionally hired divers. Once the transfer is complete, the oil is expected to remain – at least temporarily – on the new vessel.

There will be no immediate need to determine “whether owners will agree to relinquish their rights so that the oil can be sold.” The FSO Safer is owned by the Yemeni Safer Exploration & Production Operation Company (SEPOC), which was nationalized in 2005 after the expiration of its production sharing agreement with the US-based HUNT oil company.

Behind the scenes NOAA has been working to model the possible effects of a spillage from the vessel, either as a result of a structural failure or when offloading. In July 2020, OR&R began providing technical support for an environmental and humanitarian threat in the Middle East—the floating storage and offloading facility (FSO) Safer (pronounced “saffer”). The decaying supertanker had been converted in 1987 to an FSO for oil, and is linked by pipeline to land-based oilfields. FSO Safer is moored about 4.8 nautical miles off the Red Sea coast of Yemen and holds an estimated 1.14 million barrels of light crude oil. Production, offloading, and maintenance operations on the Safer were suspended in 2015 because of the country’s civil war. As a result, the Safer’s structural integrity has significantly deteriorated and there is a risk that it could break apart, combust, or explode.

Within the international response community, many models have been run and reports written, including use of OR&R’s GNOME suite of spill trajectory and weathering tools—however, an important contribution to the mitigation effort was the analysis and interpretation of those results and reports.

OR&R staff supported the analysis of the threat posed by the Safer by interpreting the science behind the modeling, so that decision-makers could thoroughly understand the risks described in those reports. Staff provided a review and briefing on the FSO Safer modeling products, which was shared with the Department of State FSO Safer Working Group, the Yemen Affairs Unit, the United Nations, the Regional Organization for the Conservation of the Environment of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and bilaterally with the Netherlands and United Kingdom. OR&R’s support to the Department of State in synthesizing the risk reports into meaningful decisionmaking information for the international committees was a critical component to prevent an environmental and humanitarian catastrophe.

THE POTENTIAL RISKS

Holding four times the amount of oil spilled by the Exxon Valdez—enough to make it the fifth largest oil spill from a tanker in history—a catastrophe with the Safer could have a devastating effect on marine life and marine-based economy in Yemen and nearby shores.

A massive spill from the Safer would destroy pristine reefs, coastal mangroves and other sea life across the Red Sea, expose millions of people to highly polluted air, disrupt Yemen’s Red Sea fisheries, threaten the clean-water supply by contaminating the desalination plants that line the coast, and cut off food, fuel, and other life-saving supplies to Yemen, where 17 million people already need aid. Other countries bordering the Red Sea would also incur the burden of the spill with port closures and disruptions to desalination plants.

Mode details on NOAA support are available at:

https://blog.response.restoration.noaa. gov/acting-prevent-catastrophic-oilspill-red-sea?utm_medium=email&utm_ source=GovDelivery

UK GOVERNMENT BANS SINGLE-USE PLASTIC CUTLERY AND PLATES IN ENGLAND

Single use items like plastic cutlery, plates and polystyrene trays will be banned in England, the Government have confirmed.

It is not clear when the ban will come into effect but England follows prior regulation in Scotland and Wales.

Government figures suggest 1.1 billion single use plates and more than 4 billion pieces of plastic cutlery are used in England every year.

Whilst this ban is long overdue the Government has been slow to act and needs to go much further to stem the increasing tide of plastic use.

Greenpeace UK described this as:’ We are dealing with a plastic flood, this is like reaching for a mop instead of turning off the tap.’

The Government does need to focus on a meaningful strategy to reduce plastic use, which should issue stringent targets for its reduction, reuse and refill schemes and the introduction of deposit return schemes. The government has no plastic strategy for England and is making only slow steps to introduces extended producer responsibility with the first stage of this started on 1 Jan 2022.

More details from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ business-64205460

‘OS35’ WRECK REMOVAL SET TO KICK OFF IN GIBRALTAR

OS35 was deliberately grounded off Gibraltar following damaged sustained in a collision with an LNG carrier in the Bay of Gibraltar

The operation to remove the wreck of the OS 35 bulk carrier from Gibraltar waters is set to kick with the arrival of equipment from South America.

Gibraltar’s Captain of the Port confirmed that the anchor handling tug Koole 42 and a barge are scheduled to arrive in Gibraltar this week. After that crews will gather and work can commence. The Caption of the Port has given the owners and insurers of the vessel until the end of May to complete the removal work.

OS 35 was outbound from Gibraltar Port with a load of steel bars when it collided with the unladen LNG carrier Adam LNG in the Bay of Gibraltar on August 29 2022.

For more information:

https://gcaptain.com/os-35-wreck-removalset-to-kick-off-in-gibraltar/?subscriber =true&goal=0_f50174ef03-cba6199a34170283262&mc_cid=cba6199a34&mc_ eid=9028f94f58

ANOTHER CAR CARRIER IN DIFFICULTY AND IMO SLOWLY ACTS

A Panama-flagged vehicle carrier carrying more than 4,500 cars and 1,300 tons of oil from South Korea to Singapore caught fire and is now drifting in the waters off Vung Tau, Vietnam.

The fire is believed to have started on Friday, February 3, on board the AH SHIN before spreading across multiple decks of 21,000-ton vessel.

There were 21 Russian crew members on board and all of them are reported safe.

The fire was reported under control by Sunday night, but the vessel was still emitting a strong burning smell.

The amount of damage to cars on board is unclear.

The MV AH SHIN is a vehicle carrier built in 1999 and measures 200 meters long and 32 meters wide. It is managed by DORIKO Ltd of South Korea.

The cause of the fire is under investigation. This seems a similar case to the MV FELICITY ACE that eventually burned completely out and then capsized close to the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean in late 2022.

The US Coast Guard issued guidance in March 2022 (Safety Alert 01-22) to highlight where improperly discarded Lithium-Ion batteries caught fire in a container while en route to the Port of Virginia, where it was set to be loaded onto a ship. The container’s bill of lading listed the contents as “computer parts,” not lithium batteries.

The carriage of electric vehicles containing Lithium-Ion batteries presents new challenges to maritime transportationand firefighting.

In this latest safety alert, the Coast Guard strongly recommends that vessels, ports, shippers, and regulators:

Conduct a comprehensive review of the vehicle shipping requirements found in both the Hazardous Materials Regulations (49 CFR) and the International Maritime Dangerous Goods (IMDG) Code. All lithium batteries are hazardous materials regulated by the Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). As such, they are required to comply with the Lithium Battery Guide for Shippers.

Conduct review of additional requirements for shipping damaged lithium ion batteries located in the PHMSA Safety Advisory Notice for the Disposal and Recycling of Lithium Batteries in Commercial Transportation. Due to the large size of EV batteries, the packaging requirements to comply with damaged shipment regulations are inadequate. As such, IMDG special provision 376 specifically requires approval from the competent authority (PHMSA or US Coast Guard) prior to shipment of damaged lithium batteries.

Remain vigilant and ensure damaged lithium-ion vehicle batteries are not loaded onto vessels for shipment, placed within port facilities, or enclosed in containers.

This all sound easier said than done. We have noted previously the pressure of ports to process containers for loading means that shipper declarations on bills of lading are taken as fact. Checks on individual containers are rarely done unless there is some suspicion on the documentation.

The IMO Sub-Committee on Carriage of Cargoes and Containers (CCC 8), 8th session, on 14-23 September, 2022 discussed a proposal to replace IMDG Code special provisions (SP) 961 and 962 with a new special provision in response to recent fire incidents occurring on vehicle carriers. In light of continued reports of serious incidents caused by fires originating from vehicles, and as a matter of priority, the Sub-Committee established a Correspondence Group on the Review of Transport Provisions for Vehicles to: continue consideration of amendments to transport provisions for vehicles; develop and prepare suitable measures to address the hazards arising from shipments of vehicles in the provisions of the IMDG Code; and submit a report to CCC 9.

MANDATORY REPORTING OF LOST CONTAINERS – DRAFT SOLAS AND MARPOL REQUIREMENTS AGREED BUT NOT TO COME INTO EFFECT UNTIL 1 JANUARY 2026

The ONE Apus was underway from China to Long Beach, California when it lost an estimated 1,816 containers overboard in heavy weather approximately 1,600 nautical miles northwest of Hawaii on November 30 2020

The IMO Sub-Committee on Carriage of Cargoes and Containers (CCC 8), 8th session, on 14-23 September, 2022 agreed draft new requirements for mandatory reporting of lost freight containers at sea.

Containers lost overboard can be a serious hazard to navigation and safety at sea in general, in particular to recreational sailing vessels, fishing vessels and other small craft, as well as to the marine environment. The work of the Sub-Committee on detection and reporting of lost containers is also relevant to the Organization’s work on addressing marine litter.

The Sub-Committee agreed draft amendments to the SOLAS and MARPOL treaties.

The draft amendments to SOLAS chapter V, on safety of navigation,

will be submitted to the Maritime Safety Committee (MSC), with a view to approval by MSC 107 (spring 2023) and subsequent adoption by MSC 108 (autumn 2023). The draft amendments add new paragraphs to SOLAS chapter V Regulation 31 on Danger messages. They would require the master of every ship involved in the loss of freight container(s), shall communicate the particulars of such an incident by appropriate means without delay and to the fullest extent possible to ships in the vicinity, to the nearest coastal State, and also to the flag State. The flag State would be required to report the loss of freight containers to IMO.

More details at:

https://www.imo.org/en/ MediaCentre/MeetingSummaries/ Pages/CCC-Default.aspx