Disaster threatens Montenegrin coast

The Montenegrin coast is at risk of an environmental disaster after a Greek tanker partly sank in the port of Bijela Friday.

Izvor: BIRN

Tuesday, 14.08.2007.

09:38

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Disaster threatens Montenegrin coast

So far officials from the Adriatic Shipyard company say there is no threat of the ship turning on the seabed and spilling its oil.

Stanko Zloković, president of the board of Adriatic Shipyard, told Balkan Insight on Monday, that “The risk of an oil leak exists just as a theory.”

“Only if there is another big storm again the ship would sink totally, but so far it is stable,” Zloković said.

“Mexica”, owned by the Greek company Zamounis and Associates, partly sank on Friday, during a severe storm in Boka Kotorska Bay. The ship had been brought to the shipyard for repair and was scheduled to leave in 15 days. There are 200 tons of heavy and 15 tons of light oil in the vessel.

Zloković said it is impossible to start salvaging the ship out without the permission of Ministry of Maritime affairs.

“We hope they will finish the elaboration in the next seven days so we can take the ship out of water”, Zloković said. He added that people are swimming near the spot, just as before the ship sank.

There is some oil and dirt around the ship, according to Zloković because it sank in an industrial area, but he says it has not spread.

The Director of Institute for Marine Biology in Kotor, Sreten Mandić, says the fuel is contained for now, but if it should leak, the sea in the whole bay would be polluted.

“It would be a disaster if the oil leaks out. That would be fatal for the sea plants and fish”, Mandić told Balkan Insight.

According to research, just eight grams of oil is enough to pollute a cubic meter of sea, while one cubic meter of oil removes the oxygen from 400,000 cubic meters of sea. It is estimated that ten million tons of oil pollute the world's seas every year.

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