Ship ‘time bomb’ highlights danger of dangerous cargo

A damaged ship, rejected by European ports because of its potentially explosive cargo, has been stuck in the North Sea for weeks while authorities figure out what to do with it.

The Maltese-flagged Ruby is the latest example of an unwanted ship left in limbo because no one dares handle it. Such ships, sometimes nicknamed “time bombs,” remain stuck for weeks or even months.

Ruby, a Handymax bulk carrier, has 20,000 tonnes of ammonium nitrate on board. That’s more than seven times the amount of ammonium nitrate – used in fertilizer as well as explosives – that exploded in Lebanon in 2020, devastating the port of Beirut.

After the ship left the Russian port of Kandalaksha on August 22, it ran into a storm in the Barents Sea and limped, damaged, to the Norwegian port of Tromso for a damage inspection.

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She was then ordered to leave and head with the assistance of a tug to another port elsewhere for repairs.

It was turned away by Lithuania, which insisted that the ship first unload its volatile cargo, and continued south.

Since September 25, it has been anchored in the southeast of England, near the Strait of Pas de Calais, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world.

Combustion agent

The British Coast Guard said the Ruby was in good seaworthy condition, emphasizing: “The vessel has the appropriate safety certificates approved by the vessel’s flag state and is capable of sailing under its own power.”

But it has been stuck at anchor since September, with its mostly Syrian crew still on board.

Ruby’s Dubai-based executives said they hoped to unload the cargo at a British port so the ship could be dry docked for repairs.

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“It was logistically difficult to find an adequate solution, which partly explains the delay,” the management company explained to AFP.

Ports willing to accept a potentially dangerous load are rare.

“People associate it (the Ruby) with Beirut but I think it is entirely possible to manage this situation,” said Eric Slominski, an expert in the transport of dangerous goods.

The Ruby’s cargo was intended to make fertilizer while the ammonium nitrate in Beirut was specifically intended to make explosives, he pointed out.

“It’s not a product you can play with, but it’s not explosive,” Nicolas Tanic of the French marine pollution control organization Cedre said of the Ruby’s cargo.

“It’s a combustion agent intended to fuel fires,” said Tanic, whose organization analyzed the ship’s load.

Erika disaster

He said the chemical compound’s Russian origins and haunting memories of the Beirut port disaster had sparked alarm and a media frenzy.

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But the French shipowners’ association said ports could also have other reasons to refuse the Ruby.

“If a ship runs aground in your channel, it closes your port. If it runs aground on one of your docks, the dock is unusable for a few months. It’s a big risk to accept a ship in difficulty,” said general manager Laurent Martens. .

In addition, unloading a cargo like that of the Ruby is a lengthy operation that “costs hundreds of thousands of euros,” Martens explained.

Following the Erika disaster in 1999, when an oil tanker of the same name broke apart off the western coast of France, the European Union strengthened its maritime safety laws.

The Erika spilled around 20,000 tonnes of heavy fuel oil into the sea, polluting 400 kilometers of coastline and killing between 150,000 and 300,000 seabirds.

EU states are now required to provide places of refuge to ships in distress to avoid environmental pollution.

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But the rules are subject to interpretation.

In 2012, France refused access to the MSC Flaminia for a month as it drifted, unmanned, off the coast of Brittany after a fire on board the ship, which was carrying 151 containers labeled “dangerous goods”.

The stricken ship was finally towed to the German port of Wilhelmshaven.

In 2015, the same North Sea port served as refuge for the Purple Beach, which caught fire with 5,000 tonnes of fertilizer on board.

The Purple Beach spent nearly two years in Germany while it was inspected and authorities looked for a place to send the fertilizer.

Source: AFP