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Grounded tanker eased off inlet mud flats Inspection by divers finds minor damage to outer hull of double-hulled tanker after successful refloating operation at high tide Alan Bailey Petroleum News
At 8:34 a.m. on Feb. 3 three tugs eased the 575-foot, double-hulled tanker Seabulk Pride off mud flats next to the shore about half a mile north of the Nikiski Kenai Pipeline Dock on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula. The operation ended a tense period that started at 5:25 a.m. on Feb. 2, when a wind and tide-driven ice floe plucked vessel away from the dock, snapping all 16 mooring lines. The tanker grounded on the mud before the crew and pilots on board had time to react to the situation.
“When the ice builds up, you get overflow and overlap,” Petty Officer Steve Harrison of the Coast Guard’s command center in Juneau said. “It will strain the ropes when the tide comes in.” Extreme ice rules At the time of the accident the Seabulk Pride, under charter to Tesoro Alaska Co. from Seabulk Tankers Inc., was loading at the dock and had onboard more than 116,225 barrels of vacuum tower bottom blend and other petroleum products, less than half of the tanker’s 342,000-barrel capacity. Small amounts of the vacuum blend and some gasoline were spilled on the deck and into the sea when the vessel parted from the dock.
Capt. Mark Devries of the U.S. Coast Guard said that the Coast Guard extreme ice rules in the Cook Inlet were in effect. Under those rules the Coast Guard can close a port or stop cargo-loading operations, although the pilot and the ship’s captain are responsible for making any immediate decisions in response to worsening ice. An inspection on the evening of Feb. 1 had found the Nikiski port clear of ice.
An incident management team, headed by Tesoro Alaska, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, responded promptly to the grounding by dispatching two tugs from Anchorage; a tug and response barge from Seldovia; and two tugs and another response barge from Valdez. The team also prepared for lightering of the tanker’s cargo into barges or burning any spilled cargo, should the need for either of those contingencies arise.
An initial attempt at refloating the tanker during the high tide immediately following grounding, with the assistance of a Nikiski-based response vessel, did not succeed. Three tugs arrived The three tugs from Anchorage and Seldovia arrived at the incident site by the afternoon of Feb. 2. Removal of ballast water from the tanker commenced, to lighten the vessel. A planned attempt to refloat the tanker at high tide on the evening of Feb. 2 turned out not to be possible, because of ice conditions and other factors. Instead, the tugs moved into action during the next high tide at about 8 a.m. the following morning. Support vessels stood ready to skim and store any oil that might spill.
That refloat attempt succeeded and, once afloat, the Seabulk Pride was able to make way under its own power. There were no indications of any form of oil spill.
“There is no sign the ship is leaking at all,” Kip Knudson, a spokesman for Tesoro Alaska, said.
Escorted by tugs and other vessels, the tanker sailed down Cook Inlet to the sheltered waters of Kachemak Bay, where divers could make a thorough inspection for any damage caused by the grounding. The incident response team also arranged for the tug and response barge from Valdez to make for Kachemak Bay, to support operations there. Two small cracks During the weekend of Feb. 4 divers found dents and two small cracks in the tanker’s outer hull.
“This is a good-news story,” said Stewart Wade, communications vice president for the American Bureau of Shipping, which had a marine surveyor in Homer for the damage assessment. Wade told the Anchorage Daily News such cracks might have produced a slight “weeping” spill on a single-hulled ship. Temporary repairs to the tanker were completed on Feb. 8 and the tanker should leave Kachemak Bay by the end of the week, Knudson told Petroleum News.
Petty Officer Sara Francis of the U.S. Coast Guard told Petroleum News that the Coast Guard expected to issue a permit on the evening of Feb. 8 for the tanker to transit south. Cracks in the hull had been plugged from the inside with concrete, she said. The tanker will deliver its cargo at Tesoro’s Puget Sound refinery, before going into dry dock for permanent repairs. Dock reopened The Nikiski Kenai pipeline dock reopened on Feb. 7, following completion of repairs to the dock, Lynda Giguere of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation told Petroleum News. The Coast Guard had already reopened the other docks at Nikiski on a ship-by-ship basis.
The Coast Guard is investigating whether the winter ice rules were followed during the loading of the Seabulk Pride, although Devries said on Feb. 3 that there was no immediate evidence of human negligence or misconduct.
“Obviously they were caught by surprise,” he said. “Some force operated on this vessel that they were not prepared to react to in time.”
And Francis said that the Coast Guard is clarifying some points in the extreme ice rules, as a result of lessons learned from this incident.
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