Black Tides

The Problem

Ships of all shapes and sizes are found throughout the world's oceans. These include cruise liners, fishing boats, naval vessels and merchant ships carrying all manner of cargo. Pollution from ships is occurring due to both continued bad practice and accidents resulting from poor vessel maintenance and training.

Oil is probably the most recognisable pollutant for recreational water users as it is often deposited on tide lines and leaves smeary marks on boards and wetsuits.

There have been some hugely damaging oil pollution incidents over the last 40 years. The first major oil pollution incident at sea involved the Torrey Canyon in 1967. 120,000 tonnes of crude oil escaped into the sea between the Isles of Scilly and the Cornish coastline. The environmental destruction was on scale not seen before but sadly this was the first of many oil accidents that have occurred around Europe's Atlantic seaboard since. Most recently the sinking of the Prestige off Spain resulted in 77,000 tonnes of heavy fuel oil escaping into the sea and many surf beaches became 'off limits' as each new tide brought a new layer of toxic oil to dump on its pristine sand.

Most of these incidents occur because the ships are poorly maintained 'rust bucket' ships or they are manned by under-qualified crew. Ship owners often register themselves to 'flag of convenience' countries such as Liberia that have poor safety standards, making it easier to legally carry hazardous cargo across the world's oceans in unreliable and unsafe vessels. Under the current legislation, it is difficult to prosecute after 'flag of convenience' pollution incidents as it is hard to attribute responsibility to one individual or company.

Sadly it's not just the large oil spills that cause the damage. Routine shipping practices such as cleaning oil and ballast tanks offshore often result in smaller scale pollution incidents, but the sheer volume of incidents make this equally disconcerting for SAS.

The Solution

Stricter legislation is needed in many aspects of international maritime law, as is the power to enforce it. Responsibility for accidents and pollution incidents needs to be attributed quickly and easily to allow adequate fines to be issued. To allow this the use of flags of convenience must end as must the use of poorly trained crews.

Measures preventing practices such as tank cleaning where it will have a negative impact on the marine environment must be introduced as a matter of urgency.

The designation of high risk environmental sea areas must be stepped up to reduce the threat of a major pollution incident.

Related Articles

8th Apr 08	Forth Wars Success
3rd Apr 07	Petition against ship oil transfers in the forth
19th Mar 07	Anti-Oil Transfers Action in Scotland on 24th March
16th Oct 06	SAS Delighted at Council's Ruling on Toxic Ghostships
4th Apr 06	Surfers Beach Clean to Remove Mulheim litter at Sennen
31st Jan 06	Chemicals from ECE Tanker unlikely to pose health risks to water users
11th Jan 05	Surfers Campaign For Mulheim Prosecution Ends With Success
19th Nov 04	Mulheim message to the Minister
29th Mar 04	Another Mulheim crashes - but this time at the Shipping Minister's office

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