Posted on 08/15/2006 9:43:24 AM PDT by skeptoid
On July 23, the M/V Cougar Ace, a 654-foot car carrier homeported in Singapore, contacted the US Coast Guard and reported that their vessel was listing at 80 degrees and taking on water. The Alaska Air National Guard and Coast Guard aircraft crews rescued the 23 crewmembers on July 24.
Incident Updates As of late August 13, pumping operations have reduced the vessel list to about 18 degrees
(Excerpt) Read more at dec.state.ak.us ...
Bow view July 28.
Bow view August 13, 9:30pm
And on APRN this morning, it looks even better , and Titan Maritime is preparing to tow.
The article url has lots of links including a PDF 'blueprint' of the ship.
Did the cars get wet ?
Utterly incompetent crew?
I wonder what kind of condition the "car"go is in.
Mazdas don't last very long on the salty roads in Minnesota...
According to the salvage crew, the vehicles are fine - they were chained in place, and the cargo didn't shift at all.
"According to Mitsui O.S.K. Lines spokesman Greg Beuerman (beer man), the crew was attempting to remove ballast water, a practice required under international maritime rules to prevent marine organisms picked up at one port from being dumped with the ballast in another part of the world. He said alien organisms can cause significant damage in their new habitat, so the water is released on the high seas. "
From here - http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1675699/posts?page=17#17
Any bets that they were running light on ballast in the first place, to save on fuel, and cut it too fine?
Nor compensated for burned fuel?
That tub looks way too top heavy, just like the modified Egyptian ferries they added upper decks to.
Could be. The ship was righted by simply pumping ballast water aboard thru a vent with a 3 inch fire hose.
Here is a 'General Arrangement' (blueprint) of the Cougar Ace. The PDF page may refresh many times before it loads completely.
Thanks for the link to the Titan Maritime site. For a landlubber such as myself, it's fascinating stuff. But what is "lightering"? Hope I spelled that right.
Please ignore my prior post asking what "lightering" is. I looked it up: ship-to-ship transfer of oil cargo, because the transferring vessel may be too big (deep?) to enter the port, so the cargo is off loaded to a smaller vessel. There are so many things I don't know!
Lightering was a common practice before the modern systems of container/ship/truck/rail infrastructure we enjoy today.
Less handling = lower costs.
Well, I guess I don't know more than I thought I didn't know. Thanks very much for the additional information.
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