MarineBuzz.com

Fire in crude oil and gas development well in Montara, in the Timor Sea has been put off successfully. Montara development well is owned by PTTEP Australasia (PTTEP AA), a subsidiary of PTT Exploration and Production Public Company Limited (PTTEP). The well is located in the Southern Timor Sea, approximately 690 kilometres west of Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. Up to 400 barrels of oil a day was leaking from this well since August 21.

Information available regarding the oil spill and fire are:

• On August 21, 2009:
  • Crude oil and gas was emanating from the well.
  • PTTEP with the approval from the Australian authorities tried to control the leakage by drilling a relief well to intercept the leaking well and pump heavy mud to stop the leakage.
• November 01, 2009:
  • At 0930 hours local time Darwin, the relief well had reached the target point of interception and heavy mud was pumped into the relief well.
  • During this process, a fire broke out on the contractor’s West Atlas drilling rig and the Montara Wellhead Platform.
  • The company initiated the process of controlling the fire and also started investigating the cause of the fire.
  • All personnel were reported to be safe with no injury.
• November 03, 2009:
  • At 1715 hours Darwin time, the fire was extinguished by injecting heavy mud successfully into the leaking well.
  • Further monitoring is going on and experts are ready to assess the damages and to make plans for future work.
  • The company has insurance coverage of 270 million US dollars and is in the process of claiming it.

Here is a photograph with caption released by PTTEP AA, about the fire in the Montara well as on November 02, afternoon.

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Mississippi River flows through Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi and Louisiana before joining into the Gulf of Mexico. Industrial pollution in this 3,779 km long river is increasing.

View a video clip from Al Jazeera: Fertilisers threaten Mississippi river

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National Geographic News has published amazing photographs of ocean trash from Eastern Pacific Garbage Patch taken in August 2009.
Click the image below to view the photographs.

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American Salvage Association (ASA) is preparing to sponsor a conference, “Wrecks of the World: Hidden Risks of the Deep (WOW)”.

Some interesting features of this conference are:

• To be held on September 9, 2009.
• At: Maritime Institute of Technology and Graduate Studies (MITAGS) in the Washington, DC area (Linthicum Heights, MD) USA.
• To be supported by
  • Association of Diving Contractors International (ADCI)
  • International Salvage Union (ISU)
  • Marine Technology Society (MTS)
  • Maritime Law Association (MLA)
  • North American Marine Environmental Protection Association (NAMEPA)
  • Spill Control Association of America (SCAA)
  • Maritime Technology Alliance (MTA)
  • World Ocean Council (WOC)
• Part of the ASA-supported Wreck Oil Removal Program (WORP) from more than 8,500 sunken vessels in the world that may contain around 20 million tons of oil and other hazardous materials.

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MV Pacific Adventurer caught in powerful tropical cyclone Hamish, spilled toxic mix of fuel and fertiliser and the Queensland Coast of Australia has become the victim of oil spill. This oil spill is reported to be Queensland’s largest oil spill in more than 30 years. It is further reported that the ship owners could be fined up to A$1.5 million ($1.92 million) and ships crew could be hit with fines of up to A$500,000. Sampling of the vessel’s tanks on March 13, in conjunction with the authorities confirms the amount of oil spilled was a maximum of 42.5 cubic metres (equivalent to approx 42.5 tonnes). Most of the Queensland beaches are closed for clean up and marine tourism is likely to be affected.

Some of the disturbing features of oil spill by MV Pacific Adventurer are:

• On the night of March 09 local time, Tropical Cyclone Hamish with sustained winds of 125 mph was about 270 miles to the north-northeast of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
• The vessel with 15 crew, that left Newcastle on March 10 was bound for Brisbane. The vessel was caught in tropical cyclone Hamish and on the early hours of March 11, 31 containers of ammonium nitrate from the deck of MV Pacific Adventurer fell into the sea.
• Due to rough weather, the containers with 620 tonnes of ammonium nitrate hit the vessel and punctured the hull. Subsequently fuel oil was spilled and the amount of oil spilled into the sea was a maximum of 42.5 cu metres (equivalent to approx 42.5 tonnes). Previous estimate was 30 tonnes.
• The toxic mix of fuel and fertiliser creating a slick of 10 miles long, 2 miles wide has reached the shores of Moreton Island and on beaches along the Sunshine Coast.
• Moreton Bay on Moreton Island is a marine sanctuary for wide range of sea birds including turtles, dolphins and pelicans.
• Also about one tonne of ammonium nitrate was covering the ship’s deck but the chances of an explosion were low.
• MV Pacific Adventurer is operated by Swire Shipping, a wholly-owned subsidiary of The China Navigation Company Ltd.

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There are many ports to get ISO 9001 certification for Quality and there are few ports to get ISO 14001 certification for Environment.

But, Port of Houston Authority (PHA) is the first port authority in the world to receive ISO 28000:2007 certification for Port Police and the perimeter security operations. Further PHA, with Orsus’ Situator – a User-Friendly Situation Management System is in the process of integrating hundreds of cameras and access points, plus other devices in port authority’s public terminals to enhance the capabilities in security operations.

With Orsus’ Situator, the PHA can integrate incident reporting, simulate security-related events for training purposes and integrate system analysis tools to provide a comprehensive security approach. Also, it enables the port authority to improve risk management, minimize vulnerability and comply with security regulations governing port facilities.

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Ilulissat Glacier in Greenland is melting at an alarming pace due to global warming. You can view the present status of Ilulissat Glacier through the webcam set up by Sermitsiaq. 110,000 years old ice cap now moves at a speed of 22 metres per day and the size of the ice disintegrating is to the extent of 1000 metres in height and several hundred metres wide.

You can watch the images of ice cap and also video clips from Sermitsiaq.

Click the image below to view Ilulissat glacier.

At night, as there is no light images will be dark.

This morning Chennai Marina was giving a festive look. As part of International Coastal Cleanup 2008, this weekend Indian Coast Guard took the initiative to cleanup Chennai beaches. Hundreds of college students, government and private agencies participated in the event from early morning with the rising sun watching the events from Bay of Bengal. The collected trash was assessed and the best team was given prize. A coast guard helicopter also demonstrated Search and Rescue (SAR) on the Marina beach. Light refreshments were provided to the participants.

Inspector General, Surinder Pal Singh Basra, Commander, Coast Guard Region (East) thanked all the participants and the event finished around 1030 hours.

Here are some photographs of the cleanup operation:

Students on trash collection drive, a dead dog on the beach

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Oil spills at sea are on the rise. The oil spill spreads depending on wind direction and sea currents. As oil spill is a threat to marine environment, it is necessary to track the movement of oil spills to take remedial actions. So far oil spills are monitored effectively by aerial survey using aircrafts and satellites. Here is another way of tracking oil spills on real time by Spilled Oil Tracking Autonomous Buoy 1 (SOTAB 1) under development in Japan.

Here are some interesting features of SOTAB 1:

• designed by Naomi Kato, professor of submersible robotic engineering in the Department of Naval Architecture at Osaka University, Japan.
• weighs around 110 kilogram.
• Global Positioning System (GPS) enabled robot.
• has height of 2.72 metres and diameter of 27 centimetres.
• SOTAB 1 has sensors to spot floating globs of oil and viscosity of oil.
• in addition it has got sensors to detect depth, water temperature, wind speed and direction.
• while floating in water, it can vary its buoyancy to dive underwater up to 10 metres and it can steer with its four fins to track oil spills.
• it can also take water samples to determine the quantity of oil.
• while tracking oil spills it can send real-time data about its location, meteorological and oceanographic data around.
• now efforts are being made to reduce the weight of SOTAB 1 below 30 kilograms and to increase the battery life to 3-4 weeks.
• SOTAB 1 project was started in 2006.

It is being planned to supply adequate number of SOTABs to oil tankers so that in case of oil spill, the tankers can drop these SOTABs over oil spills. There after continuous monitoring of oil spills can be done by SOTAB. Also these SOTABs can be air dropped over oil spills to keep continuous track.

Here is a photograph of SOTAB 1 from Primidi.

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Here is a disturbing news report from ‘The Local’ dated July 16, 12:31 CET which says

• two barges collided in the Elbe River near Altengamme and 400 tonnes of diesel fuel oil spilled into the river
• four of eight fuel tanks of 82 metre barge Undine are severely damaged
• floating oil barriers are laid to contain the 10 km long oil slick
• investigations are going on with both the captains
• environmental damages are to be assessed

Read more from The Local.

Update: July 19

Here is the reason for the spill – The anchor of the 95-metre river freighter, the Aldebaran, ripped open four fuel tanks of the barge Undine when the vessels tried to pass on the busy waterway. Read more from Sustainable Shipping.

Here are some related posts on pollution response:

• How super absorbent Imbiber beads contain oil and chemical spills at sea
• Vessel of opportunity skimming system for pollution response
• Nanowire membranes of MIT to absorb and recover oil from oil spills at sea

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers have found an easy way to tackle recurring oil spills at sea. MIT has developed a nanowire miracle membrane to absorb oil from water.

Here are the interesting features of their findings:

• a membrane of nanowires that is as thin as a paper can absorb up to 20 times its weight in oil.
• the membrane is made of potassium manganese oxide and is stable at high temperatures.
• the oil itself can be recovered from the loaded membrane by heating above the boiling point of oil.
• can be recycled many times for future use.
• can also be used for filtering and water purification.
• inexpensive as mass production is possible using nanomaterials.
• working principle of nanowire membrane
  • the nanowire membrane has many tiny pores that make for good capillarity, or the ability to absorb liquids.
  • a water-repelling coating on the membrane keeps water from penetrating into the membrane.
  • oil is not repelled and easily seeps into the membrane
• in water it remains dry as long as there is no oil in the water.

The nanowire membrane will be having advantages over super absorbing Imbiber Beads in terms of cost, recycling, oil recovery.

Here is a photo that demonstrates removal of a layer of gasoline (dyed blue) from a vial of water by nanowire membrane.

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On the night of June 03rd, two ships collided about 12 miles (20 km) from the port of Montevideo that caused an oil spill. Some of the disturbing features of the oil spill incident are:

• The Maltese-registered tanker Sea Bird was anchored on the La Plata River about 20 kilometres off the port Montevideo, Uruguay’s capital.
• Greek oil tanker Syros, collided with Sea Bird while trying to avoid a collision with a third vessel.
• At the time of collision Greek ship Syros was in ballast with no cargo on board and a bunker tank on the double bottom port side of the vessel was ripped open.
• About 14,000 cubic meters of fuel oil was spilled and further leakage has been stopped.
• Due to winds approximately 40 kilometer long oil spill is spreading towards Buenos Aires in Argentina.
• No one is injured in the collision.
• Argentina and Uruguay are monitoring the oil spill and are working to dissolve the fuel oil into the water.

Here is a photograph:

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Image source:Earthrace

Earthrace presently on setting a speed world record to circumnavigate the Earth,

• has sighted plastic soup in the Pacific Ocean to the size of texas before reaching Hawaii.
• the plastic soup is the result of Pacific Ocean Gyre

Here are the photos of Plastic ocean rubbish and Pacific Ocean gyre from powerboat-world.

For more information on Pacific Ocean rubbish dump, read powerboat-world.

Here is an interesting video clip on Plastic Soup.

The 20th Triennial International Oil Spill Conference (IOSC) on Prevention, Preparedness, Response and Restoration is ready to begin. Over 2,000 people from 50 countries are expected to attend the technical sessions and view more than 250 exhibits. The Conference theme for 2008 is: “Creating a Culture of Preparedness”

The interesting part of IOSC:

• to showcase on-water demonstrations of state of the art spill response technologies on Monday May 5th at the Convention Center’s riverfront.
• demonstrations are scheduled to showcase aerial, on-water, dockside, and static displays from the US Coast Guard, US Navy, and local, regional, as well as national response companies.
• an exciting opportunity to see real response crews and equipment in use on the Savannah River.

When ?

May 04 – 08, 2008

Where ?

At Savannah International Trade & Convention Center, Savannah, Georgia, USA

The IOSC Conference schedule is available here. More details are here at iosc.

Oceans can no longer be exploited and neglected. Marine debris kills more than one million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and turtles each year. Ocean Conservancy is on a global mission to save the oceans for more than thirty years. Ocean Conservancy envisions a future in which no place on earth is ignored in the fight against debris. The International Coastal Cleanup (ICC) is a fundamental aspect of this vision.

On September 15, 2007 International Coastal Cleanup (ICC) was undertaken worldwide. The Cleanup saw an increase in international representation in 2007, with 76 countries holding a cleanup event compared to the 66 who participated in 2006. This year’s cleanup will be held on September 20, 2008.

The interesting features of ICC 2007 are:

• more than 378,192 volunteers participated in the cleanup operation
• volunteers were from 76 Countries and 45 States
• removed 6,075,698.4 pounds of debris from over 33,426.45 miles of shoreline
• approximately 182 pounds of trash collected per mile of shoreline
• removed an average of 16 pounds of trash per person
• volunteers removed nearly 2 million cigarettes. An average of 5 cigarettes per volunteer.
• 81 birds, 63 fish, 49 invertebrates, 30 mammals, 11 reptiles, and one amphibian were found entangled in debris during the cleanup
• 8,321 divers took part in underwater cleanup efforts and cleaned up 161,513 pounds of debris over 1,000 miles of underwater terrain. An average of 20 pounds of trash collected per diver.
• 247,099 debris items related to derelict fishing gear were removed during the cleanup. This includes crab/lobster/fish traps, fishing line, fishing lures/light sticks, fishing nets and rope

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