Merchant vessel splits in two, causes oil spill
A Singapore-bound merchant vessel from Jeddah split into two, around 840 nautical miles off the south west coast of Mumbai, outside the search and rescue region of India on Monday morning resulting in an oilspill.
Mol Comfort, the 316-metre-long vessel was carrying 4,500 containers from Saudi Arabia. “The vessel hull broke into two off the Mumbai coast, and the crew members were rescued from the ship in two life rafts and a life boat,” a coast guard official said.
“It is difficult to say how much oil spill has taken place. A distress call was received from the ship in the morning, and the rescue operations continued till the evening. The area where the oil spill took place is out of the exclusive economic zone of our country,” he added.
Damodar Tandel, president of Akhil Machimar Samiti questioned, “In the last two to three years, several ships have caused oil spill, during rainy seasons, which slowly reach our coast. It destroys the mangroves and other marine life. The breeding season for the fish is going on and they take help of mangroves to breathe.”
The cause behind the incident was yet to be ascertained. It was also not known what the ship was transporting. The coast guard coordinated the rescue operation, and all the 26 members of the crew — 12 Russians and 14 Filipinos — were rescued.
The Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, Mumbai, diverted three ships — MV Hanjin Bejing, MV Zim India and MV Yantian Express, which were traveling nearby, for the rescue operation.
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