MEDIA UPDATE 6.50am 11 November:
- 6 salvors remained
on board Rena overnight, maintaining continuous pumping from the number 5
starboard tank into the tanker Awanuia.
- The salvage team
advises they are making good progress with increasing the flow rate of the
oil.
- An update on the
total amount of oil pumped from the tank will be provided this afternoon
at the press conference. The total amount removed as at 14.45pm yesterday
was 54 tonnes.
- Shoreline clean-up
teams will be working on
The next media update will be at 10.30am.
Rena update 87: 10 November 2011: 6.00pm
Oil is now being continuously pumped at a stable
rate from the submerged number 5 starboard fuel oil tank on the grounded
container ship Rena, Maritime New Zealand (MNZ) says.
As at 3pm today, around 54 tonnes of heavy fuel oil
from the tank had been transferred to the adjacent oil tanker Awanuia.
MNZ Salvage Unit Manager Arthur Jobard said this
left around 300 tonnes of oil still to be pumped off the ship to empty the
final and most challenging tank.
“It is really pleasing to see oil being pumped from
this tank,” Mr Jobard said.
“Getting to this point has been incredibly
challenging for the salvors. They have worked tirelessly to start removing oil
despite setbacks along the way, and this is a significant milestone for the
entire operation.
“Every tonne of oil they take off the ship is
another tonne that will not go into the water.”
Mr Jobard said the team was now working to speed up
the pumping rate from the tank, in an effort to get the oil off as quickly as
possible. The team was using a “hot tapping” technique, which is a method of
extracting oil from the submerged tank without allowing the oil in the tank to
leak out.
The pumping rate is currently around 3 tonnes
an hour but salvors were working to increase this by installing a 4th hot
tap and adding other pumps.
Mr Jobard
said once all the oil had been pumped off the ship, then, weather permitting, container
removal from Rena would begin.
The container barge, Sea Tow 60, was already on
hand ready to start work and the crane barge, Smit Borneo, was also on its way
from Singapore and was due to arrive by early December.
This bigger barge has a greater reach, which will
enable it to recover containers out of reach of the ST60. It also has
accommodation on board which will allow salvors to remain on the barge, thus saving
transfer time.
National On Scene Commander Rob Service said
shoreline clean-up assessment teams had been working on Motiti
Island today, and on beach areas
between Mount Maunganui
New Zealand Defence Force personnel, volunteers and
contractors were involved in clean-up operations in the same areas.
“The volunteers continue to be a very important
part of the oil spill response,” Mr Service said.
“We saw around 120 volunteers participating in
beach clean-up operations yesterday, and today, they have been involved in the
surf washing process being trialled at Papamoa Beach
Surf washing is an oil spill response technique in
which a light digger excavates sand and deposits it at the water’s edge, where
natural tidal movement separates out clumps of oil, which are then collected.
Mr Service said the trials had gone well today and
there would be further surf washing operations tomorrow.
Source: Maritime New
Zealand
