Indian Coast Guard rescues captain, crew member from burning oil tanker off SL Coast

Official Sources have told WION that the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) has rescued the captain and a crew member from the burning oil-tanker MT New Diamond, that is about 37 nautical miles east of the Central Sri Lankan Coast.

The master of the oil-tanker is said to be on-board Indian Coast Guard Shaurya that is at the location, and is coordinating the firefighting and rescue operations.

So far, 22 crew members of the Panama-fagged oil-tanker have been rescued and one crew member is said to be missing. The authorities maintain that there is no oil spill in the area, however there were two explosions heard near the seat of fire during the early hours of Friday.

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Two Sri Lankan tugs Ravana and Vishaba alongwith ALP Winger, have been assisting in fire fighting operations with spray of water and foam. Spraying of water and foam around the boundary wall around the main crude oil tanks is done to ensure that the heat doesn’t transfer via the ship’s body. So far, it is being said that the fire hasn’t spread to the cargo hold of the ship.

Two Sri Lankan Naval Ships and INS Sahyadri are also in the area. Continuous Aerial recce is being carried out by Indian Coast Guard Dornier Aircraft and Sri Lankan Airforce Beachcraft. A crack measuring twometers has been observed on the Portside of the tanker, nearly 10 meters above the waterline.

The ships involved in freighting operations have been able to put out the fire in the accommodation area and exhaust funnel of the vessel, but a fire is has been noticed near Port RU Fuel oil tank area.

MT New Diamond is reportedly carrying more that 2.7 lakh MT Kuwait export crude oil that was destined for Paradip, Odisha. To bolster efforts towards firefighting and prevention of a possible oil spill, ICG has additionally deployed Coast Guard Ships Sarang and Sujay with Pollution Response Equipment and Chetak Helicopter embarked. Coast Guard Fast Patrol Ships Ameya and Abheek have been deployed from Karaikal and Chennai respectively, with 1000 Ltrs Oil Spill Dispersant (OSD), Dry Chemical Powder (DCP) and AFFF liquid to augment pollution response efforts.

ICG Pollution Response Ship Samudra Paheredar which is deployed specifically for any oil spill contingency, is also meant to take part in this operation. Two emergency towing vessels are being deployed by Government of India for augmenting towing assistance. ICG Pollution Response Teams & vessels are kept standby with embarkation plan of equipment at short notice.

Two ICG Dornier aircraft with Oil Spill Dispersants and Pollution Response Spray pods departed from Chennai to Mattalla (Hambantota), on Friday morning, in pollution response configuration for aerial assessment of the vessel and tackle any possible oil spill.

According to Marinetraffic.com, MT New Diamond is a 20-year old Crude oil tanker that is 333 meters long and 60 meters wide.