Marine Log - September 2008 - (Page 20)

ICE CLASS TANKERS SLICK CLEANUP continued from page 17 transit the waterway. DECONTAMINATION SITES OPENED One solution to getting traffic moving again was vessel hull decontamination sites. These sites were opened to clean ships to allow them to transit outside of the safety zone. At the sites, a work boat, pressure washer and crew of three went down each side of the vessel cleaning the oil from bow to stern. Containment boom was placed downstream of the vessel and absorbent materials were placed inside the containment boom to collect any oil washed off the hull. Soon, an increasing number of decontaminated vessels began to transit the waterway and salvage of the barge got under way, starting with the raising of the bow section. By July 28, the Coast Guard reported that 30 vessels had been moved out of the affected area, with another 60 to be moved that day. By July 31, the total number of decontaminated ships had reached 120—and by the next day vessel traffic was moving again with safety restrictions and the entire length of the river’s ship channel was open to deepdraft vessels . On August 10, the Coast Guard and salvage contractor Bisso Marine, which is headquartered in Houston, but has a logistics base in New Orleans, removed the stern section, the final piece of the barge. There were some glitches along the way, including a secondary discharge from the barge before it was raised. However, it became clear that a major spill had been turned from an environmental catastrophe in the making into a manageable challenge. A key element in all this was the work was the Maritime Transportation System Recovery Unit (MTSRU)—a unit of the planning section of the Incident Command System and is established for every incident that significantly disrupts the maritime transportation system (see sidebar, page 20). As of press time, traffic appears to be flowing, clean up continues and all the signs are that this was an incident dealt with as efficiently and rapidly as it should have been. What certainly looks to have helped was that it occurred in an area with an ample inventory of spill response Tanker undergoes decontamination 20 MARINE LOG SEPTEMBER 2008 www.marinelog.com http://www.csdsealingsystems.com http://www.csdsealingsystems.com http://www.marinelog.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Marine Log - September 2008

Marine Log - September 2008 Editorial Second Thoughts Update Contents Inside Washington Slick Cleanup The Women of WISTA Keeping Ships at Sea Connected Shipbuilding Shakeup Newsmakers Tech News Contracts Events Website Directory ML Buyer's Guide ML Marketplace Letters Marine Salvage

Marine Log - September 2008

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