Tag: Port of Busan

Responsible for the Cosco Busan oil spill The pilot of a cargo ship that struck the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and caused a massive oil spill wants to get back his mariner's license so he get out on the water again.An attorney for 64-year-old John Cota of Petaluma says his client wants to work as a tugboat captain. The San Jose Mercury News reports the Coast Guard denied Cota's appeals to regain his license on Feb. 1zz3.Cota was piloting the Cosco Busan ship in heavy fog on Nov. 7, 2007 when it sideswiped a bridge tower. More than 50,000 gallons of oil leaked into the San Francisco Bay, contaminating 26 miles of shoreline.Cota pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges of illegally discharging oil in the bay and killing thousands of birds. He was sentenced to 10 months in prison in July 2009.Source: AP

They say dispensed drugs to the pilot of the Cosco Busan The owners and operators of a container ship that slammed into the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge in 2007 and spilled thousands of gallons of oil into San Francisco Bay have sued the Northern California pharmacists they claim negligently dispensed prescription drugs to the pilot of the Cosco Busan.The ship's owner, Regal Stone Ltd., and operator Fleet Management Ltd. Alleged in court papers filed in San Francisco Superior Court Friday that the pills "recklessly" provided by pharmacists at a Longs drug store in Petaluma, Calif. had so clouded pilot John Cota's judgment and dulled his reflexes that they led to the crash.The container ship spilled more than 50,000 gallons of oil into the bay after it collided with a bridge tower. The fuel traveled to beaches north and south of San Francisco, and biologists have blamed the spill for the deaths of more than 2,400 birds.Michael DeAngelis, a spokesman for Rhode Island-based CVS Caremark, which owns Longs, said Wednesday that the company thinks Longs has no liability in the accident and plans to fight the lawsuit.Last year, Regal Stone and Fleet Management agreed to pay $4.4 million in damages to ...

It caused damage to the region's once-plentiful schools of Pacific herring The cargo ship accident that dumped tens of thousands of gallons of thick, tarry ship fuel into San Francisco Bay caused lasting damage to the region's once-plentiful schools of Pacific herring, the bay's only commercially fished species, according to a study released Monday.Herring embryos collected from shorelines left coated in oil starting about 3 months after the November 2007 Cosco Busan spill suffered from unusually high death rates and a range of ailments and deformities associated with exposure to the chemicals in crude oil, the study found."The majority of embryos in samples from oiled sites were dead on examination in the laboratory," wrote the study's authors, who were led by John Incardona, a toxicologist with the fisheries division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.By 2010, death rates had returned to normal, but the embryos continued to show heart defects that are a common symptom in herring of oil exposure.The bay's Pacific herring are the largest coastal population in the continental U.S. and a key element of the bay's complex food web, according to the study, which was published online by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.The ...

Busan is making progress in becoming a green port South Korea's Busan port is making progress in becoming a green port as part of the government's effort to drive the economy towards low-carbon and environmentally friendly growth.Under a plan to reduce greenhouse gas from Busan port by 30% to 385,000 tonnes by 2020, the Busan Port Authority (BPA) will incorporate alternative maritime power and change yard tractors into ones using changeable batteries or hybrid engines.In addition, e-RYGC powered by electricity will be expanded to all terminals and the lighting equipment of the port will be changed to LED-based, the port authority said."Besides the air quality management efforts, BPA will try to improve water and noise (pollution) by introducing comprehensive monitoring system," BPA said.Source: Seatrade Asia

Cosco Busan oil spill polluted the bay killing the wildlife Companies responsible for a 2007 San Francisco Bay oil spill that occurred when a ship slammed into a bridge agreed Monday to pay $44.4 million toward the cleanup and damage to the environment, including the deaths of thousands of birds.The proposed settlement is the final chapter in the nearly four-year legal saga involving lawsuits against Regal Stone Ltd., which owned the ship that hit the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge on Nov. 7, 2007, and Fleet Management Ltd., which operated it.The deal still requires approval by a federal judge after a 30-day public comment period."This settlement resolves all claims," said Assistant Attorney General Ignacia Moreno, the Department of Justice's highest-ranking environmental prosecutor. "What you are seeing here ... is finality."Moreno said the settlement is the largest of its kind, resolving a lawsuit filed under the 1990 Oil Pollution Act passed after the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska.Several lawsuits were filed under the act against BP following the massive 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill off the Gulf Coast.With San Francisco Bay serving as a backdrop on a clear, sunny day, the settlement in the California case was announced on Treasure Island ...

Hanjin will never give up Yongdo shipyard "Hanjin will never give up Yongdo shipyard and leave it," the shipyard's chairman, Jo Nam-Ho, promised while speaking this morning at City Hall in Busan.Chairman Jo announced: "Establishment of competitiveness comes first for Hanjin to revive and rehire retired employees. We will help as much as we can to fund the retired for their children's school expenses, etc. and respect the voluntary retirees." 
Jo was speaking as Hanjin Heavy's yard gets back to business following an acrimonious six month strike. 
Jo emphasized, "Agreements with labour union will be thoroughly observed and current employment will be maintained until normalization. Also, we will do our best to normalize in three years and take our family who left us with no choice back to Hanjin."Source: Seatrade-Asia

With aim to provide prompt and effective services for freight and passengers Four ports in east China's Shandong Province signed a strategic alliance with the largest port of the Republic of Korea (ROK) on Wednesday in Qingdao, Qingdao Port of Shandong announced in a press release.Aiming to build a shipping and logistics center in northeast Asia, the alliance is jointly formed by Shandong's Qingdao Port, Yantai Port, Rizhao Port, Weihai Port and the ROK's Port of Busan.The five ports agreed that they would mutually provide prompt and effective services for freight and passengers. They will also promote transit transport via the development of the Eurasian continental bridge, and boost the links between bonded areas in Shandong and Busan Free Trade Zone.With the agreement, the five ports will focus on the development of automobile freight transportation via sea and land, as well as the development of luxury cruises.The throughput capacity amounted to 925 million tonnes in 2010 by the four ports in Shandong. Busan Port is the largest one in ROK, which handled 14,183,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) in 2010, 74 percent of the total in ROK.The five ports would utilize technologies involving low carbon emissions and information to reduce operational ...