Tanker claim ‘exaggerated’

Press, 31 March 1980, Page 10

Tanker claim ‘exaggerated’

PA •■ ; - -. '.-. ■ •■ - -Wellington ?; A claim .that tmany. big? oil tankers arrive in New Zealand with - only; a “shop’ atlas” for navigation. are exaggerated, according to the director of the Marine Division of the Ministry, of i-Transport (Mr H. ?D. M. Jones). ’ - The chairman’. of ■• \ the Northland Harbour . Board (Mr iJ. Carney) ■ said last week that, special sea lanes, for . tankers ’ would not be muchuse?;in? New .Zealand because half of the arriving tankers had no charts. •-.. “Half Of them arrive withan atlas and don’t even know where they are," he said. “We have had ships arrive here with the atlas you can buy in a shop and these are tankers with oil in them’. Not 20,000 or 30,000-tonn<?

tankers:-, -these . are : huge crude- tankers.” -■■< - ■

The Northland assistant harbour master,. Captain J. Kirkham, said overseas tankers arrived with tremendous navigational equipment on board but‘did npt know. how. to use it. . .'? ? ? . ,t ' Mr'.Jones? said that while there would have been .some instances of deficient charts there was ho evidence that the. problem-; was 1 as big as suggested by . the . Northland board. . ;? - “We have-had no evidence of- these hig tankers coming tn without.charts,”, he said. “We have had lots of the ’mailer vessels, particularly fishing boats,, without -them and normally when the ship comes in and we have reason to believe they haven’t got charts we . make sure they get .them.” ,'. s j -' -Mr Jones? said he could believe that ■ an occasional tanker would • arrive with only .a large-scale chart but that could be because detailed charts were riot available in the Middle East, where the tanker was loaded. In such cases they would get detailed charts in New Zealand. The remark about not using - navigational equipment was generalised. In some systems New Zealand did not;have the shore beacons for the equipment to relate to so that that particular equipment could not be used.

“If the Northland pilots come across any- cases where a tanker has ■ no charts they have a responsibility to let us know and we will take action,” said Mr Jones. “We have the power to compel these vessels to carry charts but if they don’t tell us about it we can do nothing.”