A shrimp trawler dragged out to sea by the tsunami last year in Japan is floating off the coast of Alaska. It is adrift, and potentially a danger to navigation, and it has more than 2000 gallons of diesel fuel aboard. The Coast Guard is planning to sink it in deep water. As a number of commenters on the article have pointed out, the fuel alone is worth $10,000. The ship is worth $200,000 as scrap steel. So why does it make more sense to sink it then for a salvager to tow it to a dismantler, assuming that it isn't worth something still as a ship? (It is still floating, many months after the disaster). If it cost $50,000 to grab it and drag it to a dismantler, it would still be profitable.
Do any of my readers have an ocean-going tug? I understand that under the law of maritime salvage, it is ours for the taking.
UPDATE: There is still a country where initiative and ambition exist...Canada.
UPDATE 2: The article now says that the Canadians who were planning to tow it apparently found that they couldn't--so cannon fire is still the plan.
Maybe the Coast Guard really wants some target practice?
ReplyDeleteIt makes sense what you said so why hasn't anybody grabbed it yet?
ReplyDeleteI doubt the fuel is worth anything though after sitting more than a year.
What mollo said - that fuel is trash now. Diesel and gasoline both go bad over time if not filled with stabilizer, and especially diesel in a wet environment.
ReplyDeleteNow that fuel is an expensive hazmat mess (at least, legally - it won't be particularly "hazardous", but you can't just dump it either), which probably explains the lack of salvage; combine all those costs - and the non-zero cost of actually demolishing it to sell the steel - and it might well be unprofitable to salvage.
FoxNews is reporting that a Canadian fishing operation has claimed salvage rights to the vessel. The USCG is delaying any attempt at sinking the ship for now.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/04/05/us-to-sink-ghost-ship-dislodged-by-japan-tsunami/?test=latestnews
Where is the Environmental Impact Statement for this action? How will the fuel be prevented from polluting the ocean?
ReplyDelete