A merchant vessel that was headed for a shipbreaking yard in Gujarat broke free from its tug and went adrift around 1 pm on Saturday afternoon around 14 nautical miles off Mumbai because of the heavy rains. For three hours in the afternoon, nervous state officials, police, disaster management team and the coast guard were monitoring the ship’s movement as it risked crashing into the Bandra Worli sea link. The danger passed around 7.30 pm when the adrift ship crossed the sea link and reached the Taj Lands End area where it coasted to the shore.
The vessel M V Wisdom was headed from Colombo to Alang shipbreaking yard in Gujarat for dismantling when the tow rope snapped around 1 pm. As the ship had no means of propulsion, it began drifting ashore. The nationality of the ship has not yet been identified, Coast Guard officials said.
A senior Coast Guard official said the ship had been lost for more than two hours after the tow rope broke and could not be detected because of the bad weather. Around 3.40 pm, it was sighted again, and it was found heading to the shore. “A tug tried to pick up the tow rope again but failed because of the inclement weather. For 3.5 hours, we were on high alert and monitoring the ship’s movement because there was a danger that it would hit the sea link.”
“The Navy had deployed a helicopter to monitor the ship’s movement and the Coast Guard a ship — CGS Sankalp,” said Defence spokesperson Captain Manohan Nambiar. “The DG Shipping will launch an enquiry. We’ll have to assess if there are any consequential damages,” the Coast Guard official said.
Source: Sunday, 12 June 2011
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