The Philippines Coast Guard (PCG) and a Japanese salvor have begun a bagging operation to seal off leaks from the sunken tanker Princess Empress, which sank south of Luzon off Pola, Oriental Mindoro on February 28th.
As informed, a supplier from the UK provided specialized bags for the purpose, which will be installed using an ROV from the Japanese salvage vessel Shin Nichi Maru.
The bagging technique is part of the PCG’s oil spill management operations, which include the hiring of marine salvors to do the bagging, sealing, and patching of all identified leaks as well as hot tapping and siphoning the vessel’s fuel cargo.
The Philippines was grateful for all the support from the other countries in addressing this emergency. We hope that along with these international assistance, the integrated response between government agencies and the local government units will enable us to accelerate the effort to contain the leakage.
…said Ariel Nepomuceno, head of the Philippines’ National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.
To remind, the Princess Empress went down with approximately 800,000 litres of oil into the sea, causing an initial 6km spill.
