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Occupied tanker near the end of Yemen - One of the biggest oil disasters in history is imminent

2022-06-18T04:22:15.741Z


Occupied tanker near the end of Yemen - One of the biggest oil disasters in history is imminent Created: 06/18/2022, 06:11 By: Linus Prien Oil tanker “Safer” © picture alliance/dpa/Umweltorganisation Holm Akhdar The oil tanker "Safer" lies off the coast of Yemen and is occupied by the Houthi war party. Since the ship is no longer regularly maintained, there is an enormous danger. Sanaa - The


Occupied tanker near the end of Yemen - One of the biggest oil disasters in history is imminent

Created: 06/18/2022, 06:11

By: Linus Prien

Oil tanker “Safer” © picture alliance/dpa/Umweltorganisation Holm Akhdar

The oil tanker "Safer" lies off the coast of Yemen and is occupied by the Houthi war party.

Since the ship is no longer regularly maintained, there is an enormous danger.

Sanaa - The 45-year-old oil tanker "Safer" is off the coast of Yemen.

The tanker has 1.1 million barrels of oil on board that are at risk of leaking.

The reason for this is that since 2015 the ship has been owned by the

Houthi war party and is no longer regularly maintained.

If the tanker were actually to have an accident, it would be one of the largest oil spills in history.

Oil tanker "Safer": United Nations wants to prevent the catastrophe through crowdfunding

With crowdfunding, the United Nations want to avert the impending environmental catastrophe off the coast of Yemen.

OCHA representative in Yemen, David Gressly, launched a fundraising campaign Tuesday in hopes of raising $5 million from private individuals.

The money should contribute to the rescue operation for the huge, ailing oil tanker "Safer".

"The tanker could break up or explode at any moment," said an OCHA spokesman in Geneva.

Oil tanker "Safer": One of the biggest oil disasters in history is imminent

On board the ailing storage ship "Safer" is almost four times as much oil as spilled from the grounded tanker Exxon Valdez off Alaska in 1989, the spokesman said.

The Exxon Valdez accident is considered one of the largest environmental disasters in shipping.

The oil on board the 45-year-old "Safer" is to be pumped out onto a safe ship.

According to the UN, around 80 million dollars are needed to start the salvage operation.

Three quarters of the sum have now been collected and further donations are being sought.

Yemen had used the offshore tanker as a floating storage facility since the 1980s, before the oil was exported.

But the country has been mired in civil war since 2015, and oil production is idle.

The state oil company stopped servicing and in 2016 the Safer was decommissioned.

On board are 1.1 million barrels of oil.

(lp/dpa)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-06-18

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