BUNKER TANKER IS A FULLY FLEDGED SHIP
BY CAPTAIN JOHN BRIAND O
ctober 5, 2011 will go down as a dark day in New Zealand's maritime history. At 0220 the container ship Rena struck Astrolabe Reef, just 12 miles from her destination. If all had gone to plan, by 0300 she would have picked up her pilot and headed into Tauranga to exchange containers before continuing her voyage.
Instead, she struck the reef at 17.5 knots, bringing some 42,000 tonnes of ship and cargo to a complete stop in a distance of just over 100m. Where she sits now, nearly 2/3rds of the Rena is hanging over the edge of the mount and is subjected to the twice-daily rise and fall of the 3m tides, plus gales with 5m swells. It is amazing that at the time of writing the ship is still holding together.
Despite everything, and the rhetoric spouted each day decrying this and that, we should be truly thankful that to date there has been no loss of life and only one injury, to one of the salvors. These guys are truly the heroes of this event and will continue to be for some time yet. Although the transfer of her fuel oil was completed in mid-November, removing the containers will take months. As the photograph below shows, the starboard side of the Rena is completely submerged.
Action on all fronts
discharged all the waste oils, entrained water and fuel oil to shore tanks. The fuel oil will be reprocessed, as will the lube oil, and will find its way back on board another ship. The Awanuia will then load clean fuel oil and resume her normal duties delivering gas oil and fuel oil to the many ships visiting Auckland over the busy summer months. If you see a smart blue vessel gracing our waterfront, give some thought to her role in preventing this disaster becoming even bigger. She has spent nearly five weeks hanging off those mooring lines astern of the Rena, patiently loading at rates as low as 2.5 tonnes per hour.
The fuel line is connected
The last 360 tonnes of fuel oil were contained in a tank below the water. To access this tank, divers had to construct watertight bulkheads over the tank. This allowed them to pump the water from the space over the fuel oil tank and remove a small lid at the top of the tank.
They can then lower a pump into the tank. If this fails, they may have to resort to pumping water into the tank, forcing the oil out into a smaller tank and pump it from there. In the photograph you can see the floating hose line through which some 1400 tonnes of oil has been transferred. Lubricating and diesel oil plus other waste has also passed through this line into the Awanuia's slop tank.
In the photograph top right, you can see the foredeck of
the Awanuia, the rig supply vessel Go Polar and the salver's helicopter hovering over the stricken vessel. If the stern of the Rena does become detached, the Go Canopus will try to tow the section to shallow water before it sinks. For the Awanuia, the next stage was for her to proceed north to the oil refinery at Marsden Point near Whangarei, where she
The emergency quick break unit on the line
The photo (above) shows the single line through which all the oil has been transferred. It is designed as a "quick break" unit and allows instant disconnection, even if the pump is still running. You will note that I refer to the Awanuia as a bunker tanker, not a bunker barge. There is a difference. She is a fully fledged ship in every way; in her classification, her functionality and her looks.
Captain John Briand is the deputy dedicated person ashore, or DPA, for the Awanuia
January/February 2012 Professional Skipper 33
