Burnt-out freighter headed for sea bottom if no sale by noon today

Press, 15 June 1978, Page 1

Burnt-out freighter headed for sea bottom if no sale by noon today

The deterioration of the mutton cargo in the burnt-out 'essel Kemphaan will compel a decision today on the Tongan ship’s fate. ®

Unless the Receiver of Wrecks (Mr J. D. Wisker) has an acceptable offer for the hulk by noon, the Kemphaan will be towed out of Lyttelton Harbour and sunk in deep water. Mr Wisker said last evening that the cargo was beyond salvage. Water lies 2m deep in the forward hold, where a consignment of 200 tonnes of frozen mutton flaps is stored. The water has flowed through breaches in the bulkheads of the No. 2 hold and the meat is getting warmer. Mr Wisker said that the meat had been checked yesterday and had been found to be ;l_o contaminated by smoke. “It is a type of meat that has a value that would make its removal, inspection, and repacking quite uneconomical,’’ he said. Many people, including service clubs, had offered to remove the cargo. “But the meat is now not even fit to be used as animal food," said Mr Wisker. No official word has been given on the next move to dispose of the vessel. Stringent harbour and international regulations have to be consulted to determine the removal of the Kemphaan. If the ship is bought for salvage of its metal and remaining equipment, the buyer is likely to face a huge bill for the removal

of the cargo. If the ship is lightened by pumping, towed to sea, and flooded, care will have to be taken to prevent the cargo from floating from the holds. Another possibility is that the Royal New Zealand Air Force will seek to use the vessel as a floating target for an aircraft exercise. But this may raise problems of allowing ' e cargo to float free. Approval from the Ministers of Defence and Transport would almost certainly be required before the R.N.Z.A.F. could use the ship. International regulations pr ovide for strict control of vessels being sunk at sea. The Kemphaan would not be the first ship scuttled in a trench in 1000 fathoms of water about 80km off the New Zealand coast. The sinking of the Kemphaan will require special attention to the ship’s hatches, with possible welding of steel plates to seal off buckled hatches to stop cargo from escaping. Although the disposal of the cargo is now urgent, any effort to empty the ship or to tow it to its grave could be upset by bad weather or the claims of other shipping on the services of the Lyttelton tug Canterbury. The tug could tow the Kemphaan to sea and could use its firefighting gear to flood the

ship. The sinking of the vessel would take several hours. A steady stream of prospective buyers were ferried out to the hulk yesterday, accompanied by Mr Wisker and an insurance company representative, Capt. G. W. Dunsford. One prospective buyer was Pacific Scrap, of Auckland. Mr Wisker declined to name other interested parties. The Kamphaan is felt to be only a marginal proposition at best. Any buyer can expect to face initial costs of up to s4o,ooo—and this figure could go higher the longer the cargo remains in the holds. Whangarei watersiders received a special rate of an extra 15c an hour to discharge cargo from the burnt-out Capitaine Bougainville last year. Lyttel-

ton watersiders might well use this as a precedent if their labour is called on. Wharfage rates might therefore run as high as $30,000. Then there would be cartage and dumping costs. In addition, any buyer would be presented with a bill from the Lyttelton Harbour Board of between $BOOO and $9OOO for towing the crippled ship to port. One crew member died in the ship after she caught fire off Banks Peninsula on a voyage from Timaru to Tonga. Apart from a full consignment of meat, the ship also carried a large quantity of sewing machines, children’s toys, and clothing for Tongan missions. Much of the clothing has been recovered and will be sent to Tonga.