OIL IN HARBOUR.

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 115, 11 April 1930, Page 15

OIL IN HARBOUR.

MASTER OF TANKER FINED. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, April 10. After counsel for the Auckland Harbour Board had stated that the case was a particularly bad one, a fine of £IOO was imposed by Mr F. K. Hunt, S.M., in the Police- Court, on G. H. Thorsen, master of the oil tanker Acasta, who admitted a charge of allowing the discharge or escape of oil into the harbour. The prosecution was brought by the Harbour Master, Captain Sergeant, under the Oil in Territorial Waters Act 1926. Mr Gray, for the Harbour Board, stated that on Wednesday evening the attention of Harbour Board officials had been drawn, to a quantity of oil which had escaped from the Acasta at the western wharf. The Harbour Master, who was informed, went with witnesses to the vessel and found that the gangway had been drawn, preventing anybody going on board. When they managed to get on the ship, they found that the deck on the port side, from the bridge aft, was covered .with oil, which had escaped from the scuppers and was floating in large patches under the wharf. Mr "Weir, representing Captain Thorsen, said that there must have been an airlock in the pipe line, allowing oil to come out of the hole used for sounding. As soon as the escape of oil was discovered, the oil was turned off at' the valves. “The maximum fine for this offence is £6OO. That is what the Legislature thiliks, of it,said the magistrate. “I will fine this man £IOO, one-fifth of the maximum.”-