The wreck of the Safmarine Agulhas is breaking up and containers still on board may break free, the East London harbour authorities warned on Saturday.
”She’s almost in two, but she hasn’t broken in two. She’s about to go. It won’t be much longer,” said the National Port Authority (NPA) spokesperson in East London, Terry Taylor. ”It’s inevitable that she will break into two in the next few hours.
”There is the danger of containers coming out of those holes, which may float or be semi-submerged. We have sent out a navigational warning to all ships in the area.”
Taylor said the ship took a pounding in the heavy weather of the past few days, particularly on Friday night. By Saturday morning, it had started to split down the middle. He warned beach-goers and boaters to be careful.
The Buffalo City municipality had been contacted and would warn lifeguards, said Taylor.
He said the Smit Salvage team was monitoring the situation and no containers had broken free so far.
Salvors have been unable to retrieve 80 containers from two flooded holds of the ship. More than 500 containers have been removed. The ship was recently declared a wreck and the crew has gone home.
Taylor said although there was a potential navigational hazard, there was no pollution hazard. ”In excess of 750 tonnes of fuel has been discharged. If that had not been the case, we would have had a huge environmental disaster along our coast. It certainly doesn’t pose an environmental threat.”
The ship’s owners and insurers recently put out a tender for the final removal of the wreck. ”Under the circumstances they could expedite the awarding of tender … It’s possible they could award that tender in the next few days.”
The 16 800-tonne Agulhas ran aground on June 26 when its engines failed after leaving the harbour.
In June last year, the Kiperousa ran aground west of East London with a cargo of 23 000 tonnes of hardwood logs.
When the Kiperousa broke up, more than 800 logs still on board were lost at sea and many washed up on beaches along the coast. A young girl was seriously injured on East London’s Nahoon beach while playing on one of those logs that washed ashore. — Sapa