40,000 Litre Of Oil Threatens Phuket Coast As Thai Ship Capsizes

[george]

BREAKING NEWS:

A Thai ship carrying 40,000 litre of oil has capsized off Phuket. Choke Tavorn 6 capsized in a heavy rainstorm amid 4-metre-high waves. The ship capsized 10 nautical miles off Chalong bay.

More info as we get it.

Source: Nation & Matichon

_________________________________________________________

UPDATE

A tanker sinks off Phuket coast

BANGKOK (NNT) -- A 40,000- liter oil tanker sinks off the Chalong Bay of Phuket, all crew members are reported safe.

At 11.00 hrs, a tanker carrying 40,000 liters oil named 'Chok Thawon 6' sank off the coast of Phuket. The tank was sufferring damage in a storm before sinking at 10 nautical miles from Chalong bay. All four crew members had been rescued without suffering any injury.

At the moment, the situation is being monitored closely for fear of oil leakage. However, there has not been any oil spill reported so far.

-- NNT 2010-09-04

[bethanysleewer]

great! another year, another tourism problem..

[ESB7]

Cant blame that one on the foreigners!!!

[Asianrider]

Chalong Bay is the other side of the Island from Patong, near Phuket Town.

Edited September 4, 2010 by Asianrider

[george]

Matichon.co.th Google Translate (machine translation):

Chock fixed six oil trucks 40,000 liters accident wrecked sea miles from Chalong 10 nautical miles.

At 11.00 am on 4 September this Wed. E.d. Prasertsri You Rat, Deputy Director of Marine Police Division 8. Has been notified by six permanent crew luck sailing away from the Chalong Pier. To bring oil to send to the hotel at Koh Racha Yai, Tambon Rawai Muang Phuket that water influx into the boat. And the accident. Away from Chalong Bay to Racha Yai. Asked to assist a quick trip.

The later has prompted the authorities to order the water Phuket The patrol boat 814, or your boat bush To help out. And found that the accident from Chalong Bay to Racha Yai Island and 10 nautical miles or about the 40th minute latitude 7 degrees north longitude 98 degrees 25 minute East Found a ship, tankers are lucky six permanent sink into the seabed. Staff can immediately help the crew of four people surge wave height of about 4 meters to depend on forever Chock 8. Another body of a ship sailing partner with Chock permanent 6 safely.

HE Prasertsri You Rat, vice director of the 8th Marine Police Division, said of the investigation. Before that incident six permanent Chock Truck Oil Depot Vichit Muang Phuket To be sent to operators of hotels in Koh Racha Yai, Moo 3, Tambon Rawai Muang Phuket of about 40,000 liters when the boat driver came to the scene. It appears that torrential rain falls hard And the waves higher than 4 meters boat accident to the boat and the water gradually Sink into the sea.

However, during the eight boats sailing Chokthavorn matched to the event was to help secure the crew survived. Once this has instructed the officials to forward observers on oil. Because fear is the rising oil and will affect marine ecosystems. As well as notification to suspend the fishing boat offshore Due to strong winds and waves up to 4 meters may fear that dangerous.

For the same day. Meteorological Center of the South west. Phuket. Report on general weather conditions at 7:00 pm southwest monsoon is moderate Monsoon over the Andaman Sea and south west. Mariners are requested to carefully shipping and small boats should suspend from the side at this stage Phuket thundershower nearly 70 percent of the common areas and heavy rain in some places. Southwesterly winds 20-35 km per hour Sea wave height is about 2 meters of areas where the rain is over two meters high waves also Meteorological Center south west. Alert issued southwest monsoon influence is moderate leaning over the area. From on September 3 this once already.

[gotlost]

To put this in perspective this is the amount of fuel to fill 526 Toyota Hilux at 76 litres each. Nasty spill but not a disaster. Large numbers always get attention.

[londonthai]

it's only a very small spill, and storm might take it in the other direction from phuket. Surely ecological damage to the coral rafs around, but not necessarily to the beaches and fishermen.

no need to panic, just authorities should prepare a plan how to contain the spill once the storm easies off. They have time to bring the equipment and the other resources from the other parts of the coast.

even if the spill hit the coast it might be away from phuket

Edited September 4, 2010 by londonthai

[rich54321]

in the scheme of things - how far will 40,000 litres actually spread? surely this can be contained its not another BP jobbie

[BillR]

probably more garbage dumped into the sea surrounding phuket daily

Edited September 4, 2010 by BillR

[phuketrichard]

Chalong Bay is the other side of the Island from Patong, near Phuket Town.

Do you live in Phuket?

Chalong bay is down chao fa road about 15 kms form Phuket town. East coast is all u got right

PLus as now it is an onshore breeze from the west this will spread out over Phang Nga Bay

Edited September 4, 2010 by phuketrichard

[asiawatcher]

Sad anyway - Thailand does not need this! 8,800 gallons is not a huge spill by Exxon or BP's standards but if it hits the coast line it will be a real mess anyway. The ship could not have been very large but to capsize it seems a little incomprehensible even given reports of 4 metre waves (most likely swells) as the area is mostly protected unless it was out of the bay and further South East. More importantly I hope the crew got out safely.

[taninthai]

and 10 nautical miles equates to how many land miles please............

18 .5 kilometers google is my friend today..

Edited September 4, 2010 by taninthai

[paulbrun]

Cant blame that one on the foreigners!!!

I bet they can..? If the foreigners didn't want to visit Koh Racha, they wouldn't need oil for their generators etc..!

[Robby nz]

Depends a fair bit on what the actual "Oil" is.

If it is diesel or petrol then it eveporates quickly and shouldnt cause any problems.

The rough seas will help with this and of course the warm temp's here.

Heavy fuel oil and crude are another thing.

But crude oil is a natural occuring substance and the envirnment can handle it in small quantities.

Big lots like the recent BP thing are another matter.

Yes I have been involved with an oil spill clean up.

[tvh13]

Yes exactly where everyone goes to SCUBA dive.

Chalong Bay is the other side of the Island from Patong, near Phuket Town.

[robertson468]

great! another year, another tourism problem..

I think (and hope) that your concern will be a little ill founded. Not only is it a relatively small spill that should quickly disperse, but you will also find that the microbes that are natural habitants of the sea will do their natural bit in converting it to harmless sea waste. Once the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was capped it was quickly dispersed naturally in a matter of days. There were even articles about reporters who went out a couple of days after it was capped having difficulty finding oil slicks to photo/film.

[w11guy]

great! another year, another tourism problem..

This isn't a tourism proble. It's a very minor oil spill in one area of Thailand. Not sure how that translates into a tourism problem. Maybe you are like the many others on here who just love to see the negative in everything. Tourists love Thailand.

[naughty1atnight]

Although 40,000 is not huge if it killed 1 whale, 1 piece of corral or 1 fish its bad.

[stevenl]

Yes exactly where everyone goes to SCUBA dive.

No, no scuba diving at chalong bay, but the diving boats depart from there.

By the sound of it the spill is in an area without any reefs, scuba diving, islands or beaches.

Edited September 4, 2010 by stevenl

[Waldemar]

Chalong Bay is the other side of the Island from Patong, near Phuket Town.

If it won't hit tourists it will hit local people then.... and Phang Nga bay, Krabi islands and Phi Phi islands....

So it will hit toursim anyway. Less tourists will want to go there so many tour counters will lose their money

Edited September 4, 2010 by Waldemar

[Pib]

Now if the BP Public Relations Department was hired to deal with the media interest, their press releases would probably say it was 4 liters not 40,000 liters and it will all evaporate by dawn.

Edited September 4, 2010 by Pib

[mmh8]

I recommend not eating the fish for dinner, nor the squid , prawns etc, well freshwater fish will be ok , for a while.

[Thules]

If initial reports are to be believed, and indeed, this 'oil' was meant to be delivered to a hotel no less, I suspect the 'oil' was very light (volatile) in nature. While 40,000 litres sounds a lot to us, given the assertion that it was reportedly lost 18 km offshore in rough waters, with Phuket's relatively high temperatures, I doubt that any discernable impact will be felt.

.... and no, I don't work for BP

[azado]

Cant blame that one on the foreigners!!!

Can do, as the wet monsoon comes from the West and farang=Westners....

[Tigs]

This is literally a drop on a drop in the ocean. 1000 liters of this stuff will occupy a space of 1 cubic meter, therefore we are talking about 40 cubic meters of oil. Imagine 40 1 cubic meter boxes and that is what we have. There is a room in my house, 4m x 6 m by about 2.5 m high, that wil hold about 60 cubic meters. Better still one of the bedrooms, 4m x 4m x 2.5m is exactly 40 cubic meters. That is the amount of oil unless somebody has reported this wrong, but if it were for delivery to a hotel it sounds about right. It is enough oil to fill the small bedroom in my house, dropped into the ocean. I don't think that it even merits news other than 'a ship has sank'. Seems like gross scaremongering. As someone already said there is far more pollution dumped in to the sea around Phuket everyday.

Move along now, nothing to see here!

[Sailfish1]

Are the responsible people going to try and clean it up? I doubt it - people in Thailand (Thai people and many of the foreignors) dump more than that amount of garbage into the sea in a week (if not day).

[zorro1]

about the local beer consumption 1 night. Still its bad news. keep an eye on overseas news and it intensity to affect tourism

[sirchai]

To put this in perspective this is the amount of fuel to fill 526 Toyota Hilux at 76 litres each. Nasty spill but not a disaster. Large numbers always get attention.

What about Mitsubishi L 200?

[koto]

great! another year, another tourism problem..

The hel_l with the tourism, what about the sea life, sea birds and if it hits shore, wildlife in general, to many people worry about the baht and not the earth, ocean dies, we die, think of ways to help, to many talk the talk and never walk the walk, end of story.

[Capex]

great! another year, another tourism problem..

The hel_l with the tourism, what about the sea life, sea birds and if it hits shore, wildlife in general, to many people worry about the baht and not the earth, ocean dies, we die, think of ways to help, to many talk the talk and never walk the walk, end of story.

I don't see the point of over dramatising what happens to a lesser extent every day of the week here in Southern Thailand.

Fishing boats regularly spill Diesel into the sea as can be seen from the slicks around them when they are moored up together in any of their local hide outs during stormy weather. This is exactly the same product which will have gone down with the sunken fuel transfer boat as it will be replacement fuel for generators that used refined distillate (diesel), not heavy crude a la BP's problem.

The currents in area are quite strong at Spring tides and flow in a SW/NW direction at a rate of up to 1.5 knots. Currently, this is the Neap tides and there is going to be very little SW movement as the wind will send the sheen (It won't be a slick!) to the east towards Phi Phi and the Krabi coast. It probably wont get there as the fuel is too light and will dissipate/evaporate before getting to any tourist spots. The only likely place to see some sheen will be Maiton Island.

So - settle back and let nature do its work, because there sure aren"t any oil booms here.