Tanker officers jailed after port accident

Press, 9 August 1980, Page 9

Tanker officers jailed after port accident

NZPA-Reuter Rotterdam

A Dutch court has imposed) four-month jail sentences on) the captain and first officer of) a supertanker that nearly) caused a disaster in the) world’s largest port, Europort! at Rotterdam, last month. Captain Sai Lit Lam, aged 38, from Hong Kong, and First Officer Pao Wang, aged 51, from Taiwan, were found guilty of negligence in allowing the Liberian-registered . tanker-Energy Concentration to break its back while unloading oil in the Europort area on July 22. After the 98,000-tonne vessel buckled, port officials found ) that oil had been pumped only from its midsection while the fore and aft tanks had been left full. This had caused the centre of the tanker to rise, and the tanker cracked and partially sank. The prosecution had asked

for a three-month jail termi for each of the defendants,] with two months of the sen-; tence suspended. However, the court said that this was inadequate because the crew’s negligence could have catastrophic consequences for the port. The judges said it was lucky there had been no explosion. The Energy .Concentration’s 43-man crew, mainly Hong Kong Chinese, managed! to escape. The ship will be] towed by seven tugs to a' nearby dry dock at the week-end, once the remainer of the 111,000 tonnes of] Gulf crude which was still on] board at the time of the accident has been transferred to another tanker. In accordance with normal' Dutch court procedure, the accused made no formal plea of guilt or innocence. I Expert witnesses told the'

.(trial the crew might have /been confused by repeated ■! route changes ordered by the (cargo’s owners. Before arriving at Rotterdam the ship, . owned by United Petroleum , Carriers of Hong Kong, had called at Le Havre and after-1 wards was due to have sailed for Immingham, England. ’ Defence lawyers said these ’ alterations to the scheduled discharging programme made; • it more difficult for the cap-; iain and first officer to keep; U the load balanced. They' ’[added that the first officer. ‘. had not slept for 41 hours be- ’ fore the near-disaster, and ‘.said they were considering an f I appeal. >[ In its judgment, the court! ■ said the sentence-would have I been stiffer if the defendants; [had not done everything in 1 their power to prevent an ex-1 > plosion after the supertanker i buckled. They had faced a 1 (maximum sentence of six months’ imprisonment.