Philippines recovers oil from sunken tanker, avoids disaster
The Hindu
Philippine government successfully recovers fuel cargo from sunken oil tanker, preventing environmental catastrophe in Manila Bay.
The Philippine government said it had completed on Thursday (September 12, 2024) the recovery of fuel cargo from a sunken oil tanker on Manila Bay, avoiding an "environmental catastrophe".
The Philippine-flagged MT Terranova went down with 1.4 million litres of industrial fuel oil on July 25 in rough seas churned by Typhoon Gaemi, killing one crew member.
The Coast Guard had warned that if the fuel had leaked it could have caused the country's biggest oil spill and an "environmental catastrophe".
"The salvor informed us that we have recovered 96 % of the oil waste," Lieutenant Commander John Encina said in video comments shared with the press by the Philippine Coast Guard.
"What we're getting now is mostly water."
Government agencies involved in the undertaking decided at a meeting Thursday to announce on Friday the "conclusion of the syphoning operations", said Encina, who is supervising the effort.
“Some 1.38 million litres of oily waste were retrieved between August 19 and September 10,” the coast guard said earlier.
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