daily collection of mar itime press clippings 2012 –...

DAILY COLLECTION OF MARITIME PRESS CLIPPINGS 2012 – 017

Distribution : daily to 20250+ active addresses 17-01-2012

Number 017 *** COLLECTION OF MARITIME PRESS CLIPPINGS *** Tuesday 17-01-2012

News reports received from readers and Internet News articles copied from various news sites.

The FJELL leaving Grand Harbour, Malta on Sunday 15th January, 2012 loaded with jack up oil rig

ENERGY EXERTER bound to Rotterdam, Netherlands. Photo : Cpt. Lawrence Dalli - www.maltashipphotos.com ©

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EVENTS, INCIDENTS & OPERATIONS

As Divers Search Cruise Ship, Reason for Crash Is Unclear

As shaken survivors spoke of a mad crush to flee a sinking cruise ship off the Tuscan coast of Italy on Saturday, raising questions about the crew’s preparedness, Italian authorities arrested the ship’s captain amid concerns that the megaship had steered dangerously off course. At least three people were killed in the accident, and divers combed the ship’s underwater cabins all day

for those still missing, up to 60 people. Early Sunday, rescuers found two survivors still inside the ship, raising hopes that others might still be alive.

The Costa Concordia, carrying 4,200 passengers and crew on a weeklong Mediterranean cruise, slammed into an undetermined object near the island of Giglio on Friday night as passengers for the late seating had just started dinner, tucking into appetizers of grilled mushrooms and scallops. “In a moment, everything was up in the air,” said Alessandra Grasso, 24, a passenger from Sicily. “People, chairs, glasses, food.”

Anxious survivors, many comparing the experience to the movie “Titanic,” recounted a chaotic and terrifying scene in which some crawled through hallways to escape down perilous ladders to lifeboats, while others leapt overboard into

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the wintry Tyrrhenian Sea. Ulrike Schweda, 63, from Germany, was caught in a crowd of people pushing toward a lifeboat, and slipped on the deck. “The most terrible thing was seeing children trying to get down this ladder they had put on the side of the boat,” she said.

Two French citizens and a Peruvian crew member were reported dead, according to a hospital official in Grosseto, Tuscany. Divers searched until nightfall for the missing, perilously probing the 2,000 cabins for survivors while the Leviathan ship lay on its side in the water, a boulder poking through a 160-foot gash in its hull. The Italian Coast Guard said 50 to 60 people were still unaccounted for.

Early Sunday, an Italian fire brigade found two people, a man and a woman, still alive inside a cabin. Luca Cari, a brigade spokesman, said the firefighters had been able to speak with the pair but had not reached them yet. There were conflicting reports about whether the ship was off course in reef-filled waters just miles from the shore or whether an electrical failure had caused the crew to lose

control. Passengers spoke of faulty evacuation procedures and unprepared staff who told them nothing was wrong — until the ship began tipping over.

After questioning him for several hours, the Italian police detained the ship’s captain, Francesco Schettino, (left) and the first officer, for questioning on charges of manslaughter, failure to offer assistance and abandonment of ship, the police said.

Before his detention, Captain Schettino told Italian television that the ship had hit a reef that was not on its navigation charts. Gianni Onorato, the president of the Costa cruise company, a subsidiary of Carnival Cruise

lines, said the ship had been sailing its “regularly scheduled itinerary” from Civitavecchia to Savona, Italy, when it struck “a submerged rock.” He said Captain Schettino “immediately understood the severity of the situation” and “performed a manoeuvre intended to protect both guests and crew.” The Italian coast guard said the captain had tried to turn the ship toward port in Giglio to make an evacuation easier, but it began to tip over as it reached the port. Local media reports said the ship had passed between the Tuscan coast and Giglio, a popular tourist destination 18 miles offshore, rather than in the open sea on the far side of the island. The newspaper Corriere della Sera cited local fishermen who said it was uncommon for a ship the size of the Costa Concordia to take that route.

However, Cristiano de Musso, a cruise company spokesman, said the ship had not deviated from the course it follows “52 times a year.” Passengers described scenes of chaos as they tried to evacuate. Ms. Grasso said waiters instructed diners to remain seated even as the ship began listing. The captain initially told passengers that the ship had an electrical problem, according to media reports. Once she boarded a lifeboat, Ms. Grasso said, the helmsman appeared



ill equipped to bring the scores of travelers on his vessel to safety: he kept banging into the ship, unable to steer the lifeboat to the shore, until a passenger shoved him aside and took the lead. “No crew member was trained for an

evacuation,” she said. A crew member, Fabio Costa, told BBC News that he had been working when he heard a crash. “ We had no idea how serious it was until we got out and we looked through the window,” he said. “We saw the water coming closer and closer.” Of the struggle to reach the lifeboats, as passengers pushed one another and stumbled on stairs amid falling objects, Mr. Costa said, “People panicking and pushing each other didn’t help at all.” Mr. Onorato, the cruise company president, said only that the captain “initiated security procedures to prepare for an eventual ship evacuation.” He did not respond to further questions on the matter. The cruise company said that the passengers included about 1,000 Italians, 500 Germans and 160 French, and the crew numbered about 1,000. The United States State Department estimated that 126 Americans had been onboard. It was not known whether any were among the missing. Giancarlo Sammatrice, 22, a cook from Vittoria, Sicily, was on vacation with his girlfriend. “I have always been scared of those boats, but my girlfriend kept on saying that it was romantic, and I gave in,” he said. “There were not enough lifeboats. The pilots were not sailors but waiters who had no idea how to maneuver and kept on having us turning in circles.” “It was the first and certainly the last cruise of my life,” he said. Source : NYtimes

See also : http://media.theage.com.au/news/world-news/ship-captain-defends-actions-2894965.html

Italian ship disaster: Survivors plucked from Costa Concordia shipwreck

A South Korean honeymoon couple were plucked from a capsized Italian liner on Sunday, more than 24 hours after it was wrecked, and rescue workers were struggling to save another person trapped on board. Teams were painstakingly checking thousands of rooms on the Costa Concordia for nearly 40 people still missing after the huge vessel

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foundered and keeled over with more than 4,000 on board, killing at least three people and injuring 70. The task is akin to searching a small town - but one tilted on its side, and largely in darkness and submerged in freezing water. Scores of divers were taking part. Just after dawn on Sunday, a team made voice contact with a third survivor still on board the ship. "We are doing the impossible to reach this person," coastguard spokesman Luciano Nicastro told Italian television. After midnight, rescue workers had found the two South Koreans still alive in a cabin, after locating them from several decks above, and brought them ashore, looking dazed but unharmed.

As the search continued, there were demands for explanations of why the vessel had come so close to the shore and bitter complaints about how long it took to evacuate the terrified passengers after the ship ran aground late on Friday. State prosecutor Francesco Verusio said investigations might go beyond the captain. "We are investigating the possible responsibility of other people who could be responsible for such a dangerous manoeuvre," he told SkyTG24 television. "The command systems did not function as they should have." There were fears the death toll could rise after considerable confusion on Saturday over the number of missing passengers.

Magistrates said Schettino, whose ship was carrying 4,229 passengers and crew, abandoned the vessel before all the passengers were taken off. The vessel's operator, Costa Crociere, a unit of Carnival Corp & Plc , the world's largest cruise company, said the Costa Concordia had been sailing on its regular course when it struck a submerged rock.

In a television interview, Schettino said the rock was not marked on any maritime charts of the area. Costa Crociere president Gianni Ororato said the captain "performed a manoeuvre intended to protect both guests and crew" but it was "complicated by a sudden tilting of the ship". "We'll be able to say at the end of the investigation. It would be premature to speculate on this," said coastguard spokesman Filippo Marini.After a night-time operation on Friday and Saturday involving helicopters, ships and lifeboats, many passengers had left the area with many taken to Rome airport for flights home. The ship was involved in an accident on November 22, 2008 when it hit a port wall and was damaged while docking. Local officials expressed concern the fuel on the ship, at full load as it had just begun the cruise, could spill into the pristine waters. However by early Sunday, there was no sign of any pollution damage. Source : Reuters / DNAIndia

The PETREL BULKER , the largest vessel ever visited Moerdijk (The Netherlands) departed last Friday

Photo : Daniëlla Vermeer ©

EU Naval Force Thwarts Somalian Pirate Attack on Oil Tanker Near Mogadishu

European Union naval forces exchanged gunfire with Somali pirates for the first time in thwarting an attack on a Spanish navy oil tanker near Mogadishu. Five of six suspected pirates detained on the ESPS Patino were injured and two required medical treatment, EU Navfor Somalia said in an e-mailed statement. EU counter-piracy forces, which began their mission in December 2008, hadn’t used weapons against pirates until yesterday, according to naval force spokesman Harrie Harrison. The last known incident of gunfire involved the U.S. Navy and took place “a few years ago,” Harrison said, speaking by phone from Northwood, England. Somali pirate attacks on merchant ships that transit the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden, an area as large as Europe, more than quadrupled since 2007 to 219 in last year’s first 11 months, according to a U.K. parliamentary report released last week. Between 1,500 and 3,000 pirates operate in the waters, navigated by 28,000 vessels carrying 40 percent of world trade, according to the report. Pirates secured $135 million in ransom payments in 2011 to release hijacked ships, it showed. The men approached the Spanish tanker in a skiff, opened fire and tried to board, not realizing the ship was a naval vessel because it was dark, according to Harrison. “The suspect pirates would have seen it looked like a large ship and gone for it,” he said.



Forces on the Patino fired in self-defense as the vessel waited “a short distance” from Mogadishu for a ship to unload a World Food Programme aid cargo, according to Harrison. Counter-piracy forces including NATO, the EU and the U.S.-led Combined Maritime Task Force patrol the Indian Ocean. Source: Bloomberg

The THE WORLD visited Mosselbay in South Africa – Photo : Capt. Christian Schmidt - AfrShore Mosselbay ©

Chinese hire more tankers during 2011, but still not enough to lead freight rates higher

In a recent report Poten & Partners provided an insight of the total crude tanker fixture activity. "Nominally, total dirty fixture levels generally remained the same in 2011 versus the previous year, however the VLCC and Suezmax sectors saw increases while the Aframax and Panamax sectors experienced declines. The influence of increased Chinese activity on development of the market cannot be overstated. While Shell again reigned supreme as the top spot charterer of dirty tankers, this title was largely the result of their Aframax program which accounted for 467, or 70%, of their 661 reported fixtures. Unipec, the second runner for most dirty fixtures concluded, had a total of 586 fixtures of which 449 (77%) were VLCCs. Unipec has risen rapidly through the ranks over the past five years and Petrochina’s influence has similarly risen to the number 9 spot in 2011 with 244 dirty fixtures reported. VLCC fixtures accounted for 152, or 62%, of Petrochina’s reported dirty fixtures. Total SA was displaced from the Top 5 in 2011, while Chevron’s increased Suezmax activity brought them up to occupy the number 4 spot" said Poten.

In the VLCC sector, Poten said that not surprisingly, Chinese charterers dominate the top slots of the VLCC chart. The only oil majors to place in 2011’s top ten were ExxonMobil, with 104 reported fixtures, and Shell, which maintained overall volumes in the low 60’s. GS Caltex and CPC tied for the number 10 spot in 2011 with 48 fixtures each. In the Suezmax segment, the report mentioned that the total Suezmax spot market "appears to have grown by about 2% from 2010 totals. Sunoco was last year’s top Suezmax charter but has slipped to the number four spot on reduced refinery runs in the Philadelphia area. Chevron and Petrobras have overtaken the first and second positions, respectively, showing the increased impact of Brazilian crude volumes on Suezmax demand. ExxonMobil has made it back onto the top ten list with 91 reported Suezmax fixtures in 2011. Valero has also returned to occupy a top spot displacing Clearlake as number 10 on the list" said Poten. In the Aframax spot market, reported fixture data suggests that it has "continued to shrink partially as a result of structurally shrinking crude oil export volumes in their primary markets, namely the UK Continent and Caribbean. Total fixture volumes decreased 3% year on year. Shell is once again the top player in the Aframax spot market, a position that it has maintained for the past five years. The top 10 players have stayed the same, however their respective rankings have changed up somewhat. Spot fixture data for 2011 suggests that Clearlake, ExxonMobil, Total and Vitol have each seen shrinking demand for spot dirty Aframaxes. On the other hand, BP, Lukoil, Shell and Socar have logged more fixtures in 2011 versus 2010" stated Poten. Finally, on the Panamax front, spot volumes "continued to shrink in 2011, falling 14% year on year to 686 fixtures. Chevron replaced BP as the top dirty Panamax charterer with 63 reported fixtures. BP on the other hand logged 46 fixtures in 2011, reflecting a 25% in spot charter volumes since 2010. Petrobras was new to the top 10 list, with 32 reported spot fixtures in 2011. While reported spot market fixtures represent only a portion of total fixture volume, the activity seen over 2011 does reaffirm the major themes of the year’s tanker market. The evolving profile of the top spot tanker charterers speaks to the increased role east of Chinese and Indian demand in the tanker market. These still‐growing



players are likely to play in increasingly important role in directing crude oil freight markets in the year ahead" concluded Poten. Source : Nikos Roussanoglou, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide

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The Trondheim homeported WITH JUNIOR in Alesund, Norway 14.01.2012. - Photo : Svetozar Catovic RRM ©

As ships come in to die, Alang breathes new life

Ship breaking at Alang in Gujarat has once again become booming business thanks to the slump in global trade, where owners would prefer scrapping their ships than seeing them sit idle. Now, if only they could take better care of their migrant labour. The view from the top of a ship at Alang, in Gujarat, is surreal—ten kilometres of beach on which hapless ships, in various states of dismemberment, lie listlessly in one of the 140 ‘yards’—a shadow of their former seagoing selves. Many are lined up in the waters off the beach like lambs to the slaughter. Nearby, a cross-section of seven floors is what remains of a 23-year old 10 MT Japanese vessel that was once a car carrier, two months after it docked at Alang. Around 200 workers have been hired to help scrap the vessel. While some are working in the yard cutting the steel sheets, taking out the nuts and bolts of the ship machinery, others are dismantling the ship from inside. Alang, once a desolate dot on the Gujarat coastline, is arguably the world’s most famous graveyard for ships, a repository for much of the world’s navies and merchant lines. What makes it ideal for this task is a beach endowed

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with gentle slopes as well as high tides that allow ships to simply glide onto sand as if they were hovercrafts. The shipbreaking industry here started in 1983 and was sailing along at a decent clip before, running into headwinds. When economies boom, ship breaking suffers as ships are in high demand. Conversely, an economic lull spells a boom as idle ships can make more money as scrap. Between 2006-07 and 2007-08, the pre-crisis years, only 272 ships were scrapped in Alang. However, in the last three years alone from 2008-09 to 2010-11, the number has more than tripled to 969. This year, Alang is expecting a record number of around 400 vessels to coast up onto its beach and die. “In the last two years we have done 60 per cent of the global ship demolition here,” says Haresh Parmar of Shiv Ship Breaking Co. Parmar, like most other ship breakers, complains about how the rupee depreciation is burning a hole in Alang’s pockets as buying ships has become costlier. He also complains about all the negative publicity that the place has garnered mainly because “westerners don’t like to see our growth,” he says. Slowdowns aside, depressed global freight rates since 2009, and high prices for steel scrap have been big catalysts for the spurt in ship breaking. In 2009 and 2010, the volumes in global ship breaking aggregated around 44 million gross tonnage (GT)—twice the volumes of the four preceding years. CRISIL estimates that, of the 180 million GT of global shipping capacities that are more than 20 years old, around 55 million GT will be available for breaking in the next 24 months. The ship breaking industry meets 30 per cent of India’s requirement for steel scrap. Yet, it is worth asking if anything has actually changed in Alang since its inception in 1983. The Supreme Court did issue guidelines on specific norms to be followed in the yards that came out in 2002, but it did nothing to deter ghastly incidents like the one five years ago where 200 workers died in a ship explosion. The common slogan “Safe Alang, Green Alang” that you can around town may just be nothing more than writing on the wall. What really makes Alang tick, is the cheap labour—some 50,000—strong—that comes flocking to this beach from states like UP, Bihar and Orissa. Average wages are around Rs 6,000 to Rs 7,000 per month and accommodations are shacks with no running water or toilets—which is why Alang is entirely occupied by non-Gujaratis. The managers, officers and owners of yards come from the nearby and prosperous district of Bhavnagar. Yet, most workers in Alang have been stuck here for over 20 years due to lack of employment opportunities back home. It is only in the past two years that they have been provided with some protective gear—gloves, boots and hard hats. In spite of this, the nearby private clinic receives some 35 injured patients everyday and runs a houseful 14 bed nursing home. “Most accidents take place because of fatigue. Earlier, Sundays were also not an off, but now it is a holiday,” a worker from Gorakhpur said. Although the apex court specified that the work will go on from 7 am to 7 pm, most yards have limited this rule only to the ‘gas-cutting’ activity (cutting the ship with LPG and oxygen) and function well into midnight carrying on with other tasks in the yard. Several other rules are also broken in the process of breaking a ship. The engine room, one of the darkest places in the ship, is supposed to be lit up before any work takes place there but that seldom happens. A senior industry person elaborating on the occupational hazards created by the ship breaking industry said, “All personnel protective equipment has to be provided as per Supreme Court guidelines. But not a single worker has been given a mask to shield himself against the toxic fumes which come out in the gas cutting process.” According to the managers of these yards, out of the total accidents that take place in the ship breaking process, 20 per cent take place on the ship while the other 80 per cent in the yard. “The smaller the size of the yard the greater the incidence of accidents,” one of the yard managers said. The smallest yard size in Alang is just 30 meters and there are some 80 of them out of the existing 140. Each yard has appointed a ‘safety officer’ with educational qualification of up to 12th standard. Gujarat Maritime Board and Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB)—the monitoring agencies in this case have not taken any action against the yards for not adhering to the rules. Before the process of shipbreaking starts, the first step is to remove oil from its tank. After this, the shipyard is supposed to get an environmental clearance certificate from GPCB to proceed with further work. According to some senior ship breakers, the decontamination certificate which is to be obtained from the GPCB after all the oil is removed from the ship to continue with ship breaking is made readily available after a certain payment. “There is a lot of corruption that takes place since a lot of permissions etc have come into play. No one is really concerned about the occupational hazards,” a senior ship breaker said. The port officer, S Chaddha, GMB however doesn’t see any reason for all the hue and cry surrounding safety. He says that a plan to provide dormitory facility to the workers of Alang is in the works. “We should be getting carbon credits for producing so much steel without using any iron ore, water and so much wood without cutting a single tree,” said Chaddha. India’s ship breaking industry wants to resolve some of these issues by putting some onus on the ship-owner as well to make sure that a ship coming in is free of sludge and environmentally sound. The idea has not found any resonance in Pakistan and Bangladesh, the two other countries which resort to the ‘beaching’ method for ship breaking, as both fear a loss in business. Meanwhile, the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) in its Hong Kong Convention is contemplating a set of rules and regulations for safe and environmentally sound ship recycling. “The proposal by IMO is such that it is pointedly against the beaching method which is unfair to our country. We are trying to approach the matter along with the other countries which will be affected by such a move —Pakistan and



Bangladesh,” a senior ship breaking association member said. In the meantime India’s ship breakers are expected to grow their global market share from the existing 35 per cent to 40-45 per cent in the next two years, according to a CRISIL study. “New ships ordered in 2006-08 will be ready for delivery by 2012, and result in expansion in global capacities by more than 25 per cent. However, global trade is expected to slow down, driving reduction in freight rates in the next two years. These factors will together improve the economics for increased scrapping of older ships,” said Gurpreet Chhatwal, Director, CRISIL Ratings. Uncertainty regarding legal restrictions on ship breaking in Bangladesh, and China’s higher ship breaking costs will help India’s players bid more competitively on ship purchases, say experts. The shortage in supply of iron ore, following ban on iron ore mining in Karnataka, and possibly other states, is another shot in the arm for the industry, ensuring robust future demand for scrap. Pretty good news for an industry that deals with death. Source: Business-Standard

With reference to the story on the banning of cruise ships from the V & A Waterfront in Cape Town, it seems there might have been a retractment on the decision on the banning, as the cruise ship SILVER WIND berthed at No 2

Jetty.Waterfront on Saturday morning and departed at midnight the same day. Photo : Ian Shiffman ©

Dutch company SMIT to pump oil from Italian ship

Dutch maritime services company SMIT will pump oil from a capsized Italian cruise liner once search operations for missing people have ended, the Dutch company said on Sunday. A few dozen people were still unaccounted for after cruise ship Costa Concordia, which carried more than 4,000 people, capsized near the Italian island of Giglio on Friday evening. At least five people were killed. SMIT has been asked by the ship's owner and insurer to pump out oil from the luxury 114,500-tonne ship and clean up oil if it starts to leak, said a spokesman of Dutch dredger Boskalis Westminster, which owns SMIT. "To indicate the phases: the first priority is to search for people missing. We are not involved in this," Boskalis spokesman Martijn Schuttevaer said. "Once we can enter the ship and if it is stable we can start to pump out the oil. Then it is up to the insurer and owner to see if you can salvage the ship." SMIT had not yet started to pump out oil as of Sunday morning, Schuttevaer said. "The ship's tanks are not leaking. This does not rule out that some oil leaks into sea," he said. The ship's owner and insurer had not yet given a mandate on salvaging the

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290-metre-long cruise ship and this would be a new, separate contract open to all companies, he said. He declined to say how the ship could be salvaged or how much time it could take. "The priority is now on the missing people and oil. After that you can look at what kind of contract you bring to the market to remove the wreckage," Schuttevaer said. SMIT is one of the world's largest marine salvage firms, and together with Dutch heavy lifting and transport company Mammoet succeeded in lifting Russian nuclear submarine Kursk in 2001 from a depth of 108 metres in the Barents Sea.

The SK SUNRISE westbound in the Singapore Straits yesterday – Photo : Piet Sinke ©

S.Korea couple tell of 30-hour nightmare in sinking ship

A South Korean honeymoon couple have described their 30-hour nightmare trapped in a wrecked Italian cruise ship, saying they screamed for help for hours after waking up too late to evacuate the vessel. The couple were rescued Sunday morning after being stranded in the half-submerged ship, where a search for people still missing out of more than 4,200 originally on board was underway.

Five people have been confirmed dead and more than a dozen are still missing after the Costa Concordia hit rocks off Italy's west coast on the evening of Friday the 13th. Prosecutors have arrested the captain and first officer for alleged mishandling of the incident and neglect of duty. Han Ki-Deok and his wife Jeong Hye-Jin, both 29-year-old schoolteachers, said in an interview with South Korea's Yonhap news agency published Monday that they had been sleeping after dinner, oblivious to the disaster outside. "By the time we woke up, the ship was tilting," Yonhap quoted Han as saying in a hotel in Rome. The couple ventured out to the corridor, which was already inclined so steeply that they couldn't walk on it, he added.

"We ended up slipping towards the end of the corridor and even got ourselves injured," said Han. So the pair stayed in their dark cabin with no power, subsisting on bits of cookie and water. They took turns wearing an extra life jacket over their own lifevests to fight the cold. They shouted for help until they were hoarse and blew whistles attached to the lifevests, promising each other they would "have a good life together" if they escaped. "The room was pitch dark. We could only tell whether it was day or night outside through a ray of light coming from a small hole on the wall," said Jeong. They tried to consume as little food as possible, worrying they "may have to be here for quite a long time", Jeong said, adding she felt "a life's saviour" had arrived when rescuers found them. The pair were taken to hospital for checkups. South Korea's foreign ministry said they are in good health. The couple, the last among 34 South Koreans rescued from the ship, said they now want another honeymoon --- but "never a cruise tour". Source : AFP



CASUALTY REPORTING SKorean ship partially sinks; 5 crewmen die A South Korean cargo ship was rocked by an explosion off the country's west coast Sunday, leaving five people dead and six others missing, officials said. The unexplained explosion tore apart the front of the ship and left the 4,198-ton vessel half-submerged, coast guard officials said. Two of the five bodies had serious external wounds, suggesting they were killed by the explosion, coast guard officer Kim Dong-jin said. Five crewmen were rescued and searchers were trying to locate the six missing, the coast guard said in a statement.

The explosion occurred relatively far from the tense sea border with North Korea, and the coast guard doesn't suspect the North was involved, coast guard officer Ko Jae-young said. North Korea was accused of torpedoing a South Korean warship in 2010, killing 46 sailors, though it has denied involvement. The ship's captain, who survived, said the explosion may have been caused by static electricity which ignited gasoline vapors from an onboard tank where 11 crew members were working before the blast, according to Yonhap news agency. The cargo ship, which usually carried refined petroleum products and chemicals, was carrying 80 tons of Bunker-C oil and 40 tons of diesel oil for fuel when it exploded, the coast guard statement said. Oil leakage wasn't immediately reported, it said. Eleven members of the crew are from South Korea, and the other five are from Myanmar. Source : breitbart

NAVY NEWS

Royal Moroccan Navy commissions first Sigma frigate

King Mohammed VI of Morocco has officially commissioned the most recent acquired Sigma Frigate ‘Tarik Ben Ziyad’ for the Royal Moroccan Navy (RMN). The vessel, the first of three Sigma frigates built by Damen Schelde Naval Shipbuilding, was transferred to the RMN in September 2011. The three Sigma-class frigates are equipped to



conduct the traditional naval tasks as well as maritime security operations. The vessels are also suited to support humanitarian aid operations. ‘Tarik Ben Ziyad’ is longer than the subsequent two vessels, to accommodate a VIP-crew and command facilities, measuring 105 metres in length overall with a beam of 13.02 metres and a draught of 3.75 metres. The vessel is capable of speeds up to 27,5 knots, with a range of 4,000 nautical miles at 18 knots. Accommodation is provided for 110 personnel. Source : baird maritime

Last Saturday the Dutch L 801 JOHAN DE WITT departed under tow of the SVITZER MARKEN from Den Helder

naval base bound for the Keppel-Verolme yard in Rotterdam for a maintenance period Photo : Ron Damman – www.newdeep.nl © see also : http://youtu.be/9QHQ5l_7B_w

USS California arrives at new homeport The USS California arrived at its new homeport, the Naval Submarine Base, on Jan. 6. California (SSN 781) joins Submarine Squadron 4 to further train and test the crew. The submarine officially joined the fleet Oct. 29 at Naval Station Norfolk. “The crew of USS California and their families are happy to be in Groton, our new homeport,” said Cmdr. Dana Nelson, California’s commanding officer and a native of Clinton. “What a great way to start the new year.” The submarine is scheduled to undergo a post-shakedown availability, which includes maintenance, repairs, alterations and testing Source : theDay

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SHIPYARD NEWS

The DISNEY FANTASY moored at the Meyer Werft in Papenburg (Germany) ready for yard trials

Photo : Kees de Vries - www.keesdevries.net ©

Lindenau rallies with full repair docks Undaunted by the unexpected loss of a major contract just this month, Kiel’s Lindenau Schiffswerft in Kiel has reported good current repair business and predicted that more will come, writes Tom Todd. However, in exclusive comments to The Motorship, managing director Dieter Kühne also said that “winning orders in both the repair and the newbuilding sectors will remain difficult” and that “the situation will not improve during 2012”.

Kühne reported repair work this month on the buoy layer Bussard, the tug Kitzeberg and the motor ships Baltic Skipper and Sleipner. He said the yard had previously also repaired general cargo and other vessels including Kovera, the tug Monsun, Warnow Vaquita, Arabian Breeze and the accident-damaged Alteland. “More tenders and enquiries are being processed so we expect the repair workload to stay at a

good level in the immediate future” he said.

Kühne told The Motorship that Lindenau, long Germany’s leading developer and builder of modern tankers but insolvent since 2008, was “increasingly developing into a repair location”. Last November he said repair and maintenance was “an increasingly important mainstay” at the yard as newbuilding sagged in the face of Asian price competition. Despite the currently positive repair situation, Kühne also said in his latest comments that “the economic situation in the yards and the tense atmosphere on the financial markets are not likely to improve trust in economic recovery. As a result everyone is holding back”, he said. Future newbuilding prospects were also mixed, he declared.

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“Once again we are seeing partially speculative newbuildings ordered in the past now being delivered onto a market which is stagnating or declining. Supply is clearly exceeding demand. Ships are again being laid up and charter rates are under considerable pressure and have dropped considerably in recent months”, Kühne declared.

Finally, he noted that continuing expansion of yard capacities in Asia and increasingly in South America was “leading to a significant rise in shipbuilding capacities and will further speed up price decline. What chances there are continue to lie in repair, maintenance and diversification” he said. Kühne’s latest comments to The Motorship came just days after Lindenau undocked the sailship Gorch Fock. She left after a three month stay without being repaired as scheduled. Lindenau had hoped for the €1m job but authorities decided to give it to another German yard. Source : the motorship

ROUTE, PORTS & SERVICES

The very smart STENA SUPERRFAST VIII built in 2001 in Germany and on charter to Stena seen here on the new

built berths at Cairnryan in Scotland - Photo : Brian Climie ©

ABS Group Concludes Acquisition of Safetec Nordic AS

ABS Group of Companies, Inc. concluded its acquisition of Safetec Nordic AS, with a signing ceremony attended by senior ABS, ABS Group and Safetec management in Trondheim, Norway, on January 5, 2012. ABS and ABS Group Chairman, Robert D. Somerville, ABS Vice President David Weinstein, ABS Group CEO and President Tony Nassif and

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ABS Consulting President David Walker joined Safetec CEO Jan Morten Ertsaas, Safetec Board Chairman Jon Daniel Nesje and Professor Jan Erik Vinnem to sign the agreement bringing Safetec into the ABS Consulting organization. The acquisition of Safetec will broaden the range of solutions and services provided to ABS Consulting’s offshore customers as well as strengthen its presence along the Norwegian Continental Shelf, the North Sea, wider European markets and with Norwegian clients operating in the oil and gas industry around the world. ABS Chairman Robert D. Somerville said the acquisition represented an important step in equipping ABS Consulting to meet the increasingly complex challenges in the offshore sectors. “We are pleased to be closing the Safetec acquisition. This is an agreement which will enable ABS Consulting to enhance the delivery of services and programs that meet our client’s challenges today and tomorrow.” Safetec CEO Jan Morten Ertsaas said, “The resources of Safetec complement those of ABS Consulting, resulting in an enhanced service offering to clients.” Source: ABS Group

Crane barge "Smit Borneo", under tow of the tug "Singapore" departing Tauranga 14th January bound for the

Rena wreck. - Photo by Don Meehan ©

HME VERHUISD HME, Scheepsbouw Nederland en CMTI bedienen u per februari 2012 vanuit een nieuwe thuisbasis: De Willemswerf aan de Boompjes 40 in Rotterdam. Ook de Koninklijke Vereniging van Nederlandse Reders (KVNR) en Stichting Nederland Maritiem Land hebben zich gevestigd in De Willemswerf.

Ons nieuwe adres is:

Boompjes 40 3011 XB Rotterdam

Postbus 23541 3001 KM Rotterdam

T: 010 44 44 333 F: 010 21 30 700 E: [email protected] I: www.hme.nl

Wij zien ernaar uit u binnenkort op onze nieuwe locatie te ontvangen waar wij ons ook in 2012 onverminderd enthousiast voor u gaan inzetten.

Two men and a port in a storm The Ports of Auckland industrial dispute has been hell: Kids' Christmas presents stuck on the wharves; striking stevedores sacrificing thousands from their potential $91,000 pay packets; multi-national firms Maersk and Fonterra opting for Tauranga or Napier instead. Importers, exporters, truckies...all hurting. And it's played havoc with the port boss' golf. He's back from his beach holiday at Papamoa, but he hasn't been on the course this week. "I only managed two rounds last year-for obvious reasons," he says.

This is chief executive Tony Gibson, "the $750,000 man", tanned and dapper in a smart suit, crisp white shirt and $7000 Bulgari watch. He has a property in Canterbury, a model family in Wellington and a rented Viaduct apartment. He keeps in shape with regular boxing training sessions. "One of my daughters recently got married and the other is having her wedding in February, so I'm a poor man," he jokes. Then there's Garry Parsloe, the union boss. A single man, he left Dunedin to become a seafarer at 15. He watches rugby. He shuns a business suit for a polo shirt with the


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union logo on the front. He wears a gold chain round his neck. He owns a flat on Fort St, around the corner from his office, so he can hop into work "seven days a week, if I like".

He's not so much a boxer - more a streetfighter. These are the men holding Auckland to ransom, grinding the engine room of the NZ economy to a halt. But-whaddaya know-both reckon it's the other bloke's fault. It was September last year, as the dispute was just gathering steam, when Gibson and Parsloe met for a beer at The Right Track, a sports bar just up the road from the union boss' apartment. It was Gibson's idea: He phoned up Parsloe and invited him for a pint.

It's an old-school working man's pub. The sort of place you might expect to find Parsloe, less so Gibson. Wide-screen TVs carry the racing, and there are TAB betting slips littered around the tables. As blokes placed their bets, the two men put their heads together- but there was never any prospect of them reaching agreement. "We actually had two or three beers that night," Parsloe says. "But I told him that it didn't mean I would capitulate." The bitter industrial dispute has thrust the two tough-talking Kiwis from opposing ends of the spectrum into the spotlight.

Parsloe, aged 67 and earning a salary of $66,000 as president of the Maritime Union, has raised eyebrows across New Zealand with his old-fashioned, picket-line intransigence, refusing to budge from eight hour shifts when you would be hard pressed to find another trade or profession in the country that enjoys that luxury. It's not about the money, he insists. It's about protecting family values. The union wants a 2.5 per cent rise on a basic annual wage of $57,000 and more job security.

After the union rejected a 10 per cent pay offer tied to a new rota system - rostered shifts of between five and 12 hours with provision to call stevedores in at short notice if a ship arrives in port early or late - Gibson threatened to replace 330 union workers with private contractors. It's not the first time this has been suggested: A draft strategy for the port, written before the dispute but leaked this week, suggested bringing in contractors. Parsloe says the leaked paper proved the ports management has always been running a secret agenda; Gibson's spokeswoman says it was a draft that did not represent company policy, and the author had been made redundant. The two men are seasoned negotiators, each with more than 30 years' experience hammering out deals at ports around the world. But they can't see eye-to-eye in Auckland.

Following a string of 48-hour strikes, a fourth round of mediation talks failed this week.There is no sign of a solution. Instead, there is a new war of words. GIBSON looks every inch the corporate mover and shaker as he holds court in his office at the Ports of Auckland headquarters, sited in the heart of the docks. He has worked in various senior shipping company roles in Africa, Asia and Europe, before a three-year spell as managing director of Maersk, New Zealand - the same freight company that has just pulled its container shipping from Gibson's wharves.

Gibson has been in his present job for 11 months, and says that despite all his experience in the industry, the Auckland confrontation has been particularly challenging. "I have had a few experiences in Europe of changes in organisations but this is probably the most direct dispute I've been involved in. It has also been an 11-month excercise in patience." He insists productivity must improve and increased profits be returned - and that means replacing a system that sees wharfies getting paid for more than hours than are required to finish loading or unloading ships.

"There wouldn't be an industry in New Zealand or the world that would accept those practices," he says. "The port's performance has been hampered for years because of industrial disputes and the handbrake on productivity that the current work practices provide. "This needs to be sorted - once and for all." He denies his no-nonsense approach is designed to break the wharfies' union. Or that he is there to slash costs in order to fatten up the port for an eventual sell-off. He even says he likes Parsloe, though the pair have been trading barbs for months. "I have the utmost respect for Garry," he says. "At the end of the day he is just like me, he's trying to make a difference but from a different perspective. "I'm sure we can always sit down for a beer as we have always done."

As he fronts the media, his communications manager Catherine Etheredge is never far from his side, even answering some of the questions put to her high-flying boss. Gibson seems dumbstruck when asked about his salary. Before he has a chance to clear his throat, Etheredge pipes up: "That is not a matter of public record and I think the point is that it is not Tony's salary that is being negotiated."

Gibson won't confirm reports he earns $750,000, saying it's not relevant: "Frankly, I don't do this for the money," he insists. "I do it because I'mvery passionate about the organisation and change, and I think we can really make a difference." Across town, at the Maritime Union offices above a second-hand furniture store off Auckland's CBD, Parsloe is delighted to hear his adversary doesn't turn up in the morning for cash. "That's great news," Parsloe grins. "They should stop paying him then. That would save the port quite a lot of money every year for a start."



Parsloe doesn't believe Gibson wants a negotiated settlement at all.He accuses Gibson of releasing misleading information about wharfies' wages "to make them look overpaid and lazy", sending scaremongering letters to employees at Christmas, then going on holiday over the festive season instead of trying to solve the dispute. "He is very heavy-handed, an absolute bully," Parsloe says. "You don't go into mediation brandishing final offers and telling your workforce they are all going to be paid off - you go there to mediate." But despite appearances, this is not an old-fashioned industrial stand-off. It's more a PR battle. Both sides want to win over the public. Both sides want to be seen as the good guy.

Pacific Basin's "Tokomaru Bay" arriving Tauranga 6th January to load logs. Photo : Stella Meehan ©

Gibson's PR woman is friendly, anxious to help with information, offering cellphone numbers for affected importers, exporters and truckies. She emails answers to questions about where Gibson lives, and his age. Parsloe, too, wants to be seen as conciliatory and summons up a few grudging words of kindness for his adversary. "I actually have some sympathy for Tony because I think he is being driven by the board and he has been given an agenda. He also has more pressure on him than me because he has been given a ludicrous financial target to achieve," he says. OUT on the picket line this week, it is a bit different.

To the striking stevedores, it's the 1951 waterfront dispute all over again - but this time, they are confident they will win. "Gibson and his whole team are formidable and we respect who and what we are up against," says Carl Findlay, vice president of the national and Auckland Maritime Union. "But the membership is really pleased with the way Garry has handled this dispute. We are going to win this and will do whatever it takes to make it so." Danny Belsham, 60, has worked at the ports for 35 years. "Gibson's whole ideology seems to be about getting more production but he has already been getting thatandwe have been paid productivity bonuses for the past five months," he says. "He has indicated that he has $6 to $8 million to make us all redundant, but if that is the case then he would be spending the people of Auckland's money like lolly water and he needs to be removed."

It's first thing in the morning on newspaper deadline day, and an urgent follow-up email pops up. "Hi Russell, Tony has asked that you please don't publish his actual age in the paper," Gibson's PR woman pleads. "He is happy for you to put mid-50s. I hope that is OK." Operators who use the Auckland Council-owned port have more urgent concerns: they are unhappy with the way things have dragged on. "It's getting to the stage now where importers are beginning to shift their freight to shipping companies that don't use Auckland," says Daniel Silva, whose Auckland import business DSL Logistics has been affected by the strikes. "The reliability of the supply chain through Auckland has been reduced and this is very bad news for importers and by extension everyone else, because goods then becomemore expensive." Silva is also secretary of the New Zealand Importers Institute. His members now believe if the dispute can't be resolved through formal negotiation then it needs to be resolved by management changing the way the port operates. Their unspoken view is shared by more and more of the Auckland business community: It is time to smash the union. Not that anyone will say it openly- not after the strikes of 1890, and 1913, and of course the granddaddy of them all, the 1951 waterfront dispute. The ports employ fewer people now-but the potential for mayhem is huge. Michael Barnett, chief executive of Auckland Chamber of Commerce, believes the dispute has to be settled before the city loses credibility as a major port worldwide. He insists productivity must be improved for the city to compete with other ports in Australasia. "Is it a contracting-out model the port needs like management suggests, or can Garry Parsloe and his union turn round and say they can deliver that for us in some other way?" Barnett adds: "If we can't resolve this urgently, every day it extends we are putting Auckland's reputation at risk." The deadline is pressing, when



Etheredge emails back with details of cellphone numbers for a couple of interviewees - and one last plea: "Tony really doesn't want his age in, would appreciate you passing that on," she says. For the record: Gibson is 57.

Bittersweet time for Tauranga

Despite the Bay of Plenty profiting from Auckland's woes,Tauranga's port boss isn't celebrating. He backs Auckland chief Tony Gibson's controversial move to replicate Tauranga's 24/7 work practices-and his hardline stance. Ports of Auckland has already lost an estimated $20 million a year from shipping giant Maersk shifting its Southern Star container service to the Bay of Plenty because of the ongoing industrial dispute.

Port of Napier is pitching to permanently secure Fonterra's shipping business.The dairy firm has said it willmove its export shipments-worth $27 million a week-from Auckland to Port of Tauranga and Port of Napier from the end of this month until further notice. "It has been good having the extra business but it is bittersweet," says Ports of Tauranga chief executiveMark Cairns."I think Tony Gibson is a good rooster,which is a funny thing formeto say about a major competitor. "But I respect Tony for what he is trying to achieve in getting the labour practices into the 21st century." Now talks have broken down again,he reckons Gibson has to take an even tougher stance with the wharfies."I think Tony has tried to achieve a similar working model to us with his existing workforce but it looks like he is at the end of his tether,"Cairns says."If he can't advance things with the existing workforce and unions, then he has to take a more radical step." Source ; nzherald

Photo taken from the 150 mtr above the waterlevel flareboom of Woodside’s North Rankin deck with the

towingtugs Lady Sandra, Far Grip and Far Fosna moored alongside Heerema’s H-851. Photo : Stephan Watt - project engineer Heerema ©



The OVERSEAS PORTLAND eastbound in the Singapore Straits yesterday – Photo : Piet Sinke ©

Maersk says unable ship goods into Nigeria ports

Container shipping group Maersk Line is unable to bring its vessels carrying consumer goods and foodstuffs into Nigerian ports as a fourth day of nationwide strikes has brought terminals to a standstill, a senior official said on Thursday, Reuters reports. Nigerians have taken to the streets across the country to protest against the government's decision to remove popular fuel subsidies, which more than doubled the price of petrol, shutting banks, shops and schools.

Sonny Dahl, director, West Africa Services at Maersk Line, the world's biggest container shipping company, said its container ships were stuck outside ports. "Everything is at a standstill - there are no operations going on and everything is at a general strike level," Dahl told Reuters. Container ships normally bring in much of Nigeria's consumer goods and also transport foodstuffs.

Dahl said eight of the company's container ships were being affected by the disruptions at ports across the country. "They are carrying consumer goods of various kinds and foodstuffs," he said. He said some of the vessels were already anchored outside ports, while others would arrive in one to two days. "We are consistently evaluating whether we should divert any of them to other ports (outside of Nigeria)," he said. "For now, we have made a plan until early next week that we wait outside. It's anyone's guess when the strike will end."

Maersk Line, a unit of Danish shipping and oil group A.P. Moller-Maersk, said the Nigerian market represented 60 percent of its container ship imports into West Africa. Nigeria's main oil union said on Thursday it would aim to shut down the country's oil and gas production from Sunday. Oil industry officials doubted unions would be able to stop crude exports completely, but even a minor outage could have a significant impact on the economy. Shipping sources told Reuters offshore oil terminals were operating as normal on Thursday. Source : PortNews

Singapore 2011 box traffic hits new record Singapore's ports handled an estimated 29.94 million twenty-foot containers in 2011, breaking the previous record set in 2008 by over 21,000 boxes. This advance estimate of the 2011 throughput was a 5.3 per cent increase from the year before, which registered 28.4 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs).

Despite its best ever showing, Singapore remains behind Shanghai, which on Dec 23 celebrated throughput exceeding 30 million TEUs. Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew made known these maritime advance estimates at the Singapore Maritime Foundation's New Year cocktail yesterday. He disclosed that Singapore remains the world's busiest port by



way of vessel arrival tonnage. In 2011, a record 2.12 billion gross tons (a measure of a ship's internal size and volume) sailed through Singapore waters, topping 2010's 1.92 billion gross tons.

The top contributors to the gross tonnage figures were containerships and tankers. Boxships made up about 31 per cent of the total gross tonnage arrivals and tankers were just behind at 30.8 per cent. On Dec 13, 2011, Singapore celebrated the two billion gross tonnage mark, when containership APL Washington pulled into Pasir Panjang Terminal.

Mr Lui also announced that Singapore maintained its position as the world's top bunkering port, with about 43.15 million tonnes of bunker sales in 2011. In 2010, Singapore made 40.85 million tonnes of bunker sales. Source : Businesstimes

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your address again, please do not write this in the guestbook because I am not checking this guest book daily.

Hess announces capital and exploratory budget for 2012

Hess Corporation announced on January 12, 2012 a 2012 capital and exploratory budget of $6.8 billion, nearly all of which is targeted for Exploration and Production: $2.5 billion for unconventionals, $1.6 billion for production, $1.8 billion for developments and $800 million for exploration, the Corp. press release said. John B. Hess, Chairman and CEO, stated, “We believe that the investments we are making in unconventionals are lower risk and will generate long term profitable growth for shareholders. We expect to fund the majority of our 2012 program from internally generated cash flow and asset sales.” Greg Hill, President of Worldwide Exploration and Production, said, “Our focus in 2012 will be on execution. We are committed to creating value and delivering sustainable growth in production and reserves from both our unconventional and conventional portfolios.” Unconventional production and development expenditures of approximately $2.5 billion include:

• Development of the Bakken Shale in North Dakota, where Hess plans to continue to operate 16 rigs and progress the expansion the Tioga Gas Plant

• Drilling appraisal wells in the Eagle Ford Shale in Texas and the Utica Shale in Ohio

Production expenditures of approximately $1.6 billion include:

• Drilling production and water injection wells at Shenzi (Hess 28 percent), and drilling production wells at the Llano Field (Hess 50 percent) in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico

• Drilling production wells on Block G (Hess 85 percent - operator) in Equatorial Guinea


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Development expenditures of approximately $1.8 billion include:

• Commencing development drilling at the Tubular Bells Field (Hess 57 percent – operator) in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico

• Completion of field redevelopment and gas lift projects at the Valhall Field (Hess 64 percent) in Norway • Concluding appraisal activities and progressing front end engineering and design work at WA-390-P (Hess 100

percent - operator) offshore Western Australia • Progressing development of Block A-18 (Hess 50 percent) in the Joint Development Area (JDA) in the Gulf of

Thailand, including wellhead platform installations and ongoing drilling activities

Exploration expenditures of approximately $800 million include: • Drilling exploration wells in Ghana, Indonesia, Brunei and the deepwater Gulf of Mexico • Acquiring seismic at the Dinarta and Shakrok Blocks (Hess 80 percent - operator) in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Hess Corporation, with headquarters in New York, is a global integrated energy company engaged in the exploration, production, purchase, transportation and sale of crude oil and natural gas, as well as the production and sale of refined petroleum products. Source : portnews

OLDIE – FROM THE SHOEBOX

The former Dutch cruiser “De Ruyter”

Foto: © J.H.C. Vermeulen†, collection Capt. Frank Haalmeijer

De Ruyter was laid down on 16 September 1933 at the Wilton Fijenoord dockyard in Schiedam and commissioned on 3 October 1936, commanded by Captain A. C. van der Sande Lacoste. During World War II, De Ruyter saw repeated action in the Dutch East Indies in fruitless attempts to ward off the Japanese invasion. She was damaged by air attack in the battle of Bali Sea on 4 February 1942, but not seriously. She fought in the battle of Badung Strait on 18 February 1942, In the Battle of the Java Sea on 27 February 1942 ( next month 70 years ago) , De Ruyter was the flagship of the Dutch Rear-Admiral Karel Doorman, with his flag captain Eugène Lacomblé (who had previously served on board the ship as a lieutenant). Off the north coast off Java on the evening of the 27th the remains of the ABDA fleet was surprised by the Japanese heavy cruisers Nachi and Haguro. De Ruyter was hit by a single Type 93 torpedo fired by Haguro at about 23:30, and she sank at about 02:30 the next morning with the loss of 345 men, including Admiral Doorman and Captain Lacomblé. Her wreck was found after the war and declared a war grave, with only the ship's bell—now in the Kloosterkerk in the Hague—being recovered.



…. PHOTO OF THE DAY …..

The fast ferry KOEGELWIECK departing from the Dutch island Terschelling during sunset

Photo : Hessel Buren - www.tugsalvage.nl ©

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