Container ship runs into Woodhouse Reef
January 7th, 2010 | posted by SharmWeb
A large cargo vessel has gone hard aground on Woodhouse Reef, in the northern Red Sea.
The 260m-long, Hong Kong-flagged CSCL Hamburg hit the reef, between the Sinai coast and Tiran Island, on the morning of New Year’s Eve. Damage is reportedly limited to the bow area, but could be severe as the ship ran on to the reef at speed. Diving operators and others are relieved that, so far, there appear to have been no leakages from the hull.
The extent of damage to corals has yet to be assessed. If it transpires that damage is beyond repair, the vessel, once its cargo has been unloaded, might be patched up sufficiently to be dragged off and sunk locally.
The resulting, inadvertently created artificial reef and diving attraction would be more than twice as large as the region’s legendary Thistlegorm wreck. John Kean, a Sharm El Sheikh-based PADI and TDI diving instructor and author of the book SS Thistlegorm, saw events unfold from a dive boat some way off, before moving in for a closer look. “The ship passed the first reef, Jackson, at 10am and instead of continuing past Gordon Reef, the last of the four reefs in the Tiran Straits, it inexplicably attempted to navigate between the middle two reefs, Woodhouse and Thomas,” he told Divernet. “The gap here is less than 80m. The ship, with a beam of 32.3m, struck Woodhouse Reef just 50m from its end but went hard on to the top by a distance of around 25m.” Possible explanations are that the ship’s captain thought that there were no more reefs after Jackson, and/or was under the impression that lighthouses on each of Gordon and Jackson were there as a channel guide. After the grounding, Kean and his companions overheard VHF radio communications between the ship’s captain and the authorities. The captain said that no fuel or oil leakages appeared to have occurred, and that pumps were at work to deal with water ingress which was limited to the bow area, due to the ship’s watertight compartments. The Straits of Tiran are popular with scuba divers coming out of Sharm El Sheikh, for the scenic drift diving that can be had in the vicinities of Woodhouse, Jackson, Gordon and Thomas Reefs.
“Navigational error was blamed as a result of VHF radio use to ascertain the intentions of the other ship.”
Source: Divernet.com
A large cargo vessel has gone hard aground on Woodhouse Reef, in the northern Red Sea.The 260m-long, Hong Kong-flagged CSCL Hamburg hit the reef, between the Sinai coast and Tiran Island, on the morning of New Year’s Eve. Damage is reportedly limited to the bow area, but could be severe as the ship ran on to the reef at speed. Diving operators and others are relieved that, so far, there appear to have been no leakages from the hull.
The extent of damage to corals has yet to be assessed. If it transpires that damage is beyond repair, the vessel, once its cargo has been unloaded, might be patched up sufficiently to be dragged off and sunk locally.
The resulting, inadvertently created artificial reef and diving attraction would be more than twice as large as the region’s legendary Thistlegorm wreck. John Kean, a Sharm El Sheikh-based PADI and TDI diving instructor and author of the book SS Thistlegorm, saw events unfold from a dive boat some way off, before moving in for a closer look. “The ship passed the first reef, Jackson, at 10am and instead of continuing past Gordon Reef, the last of the four reefs in the Tiran Straits, it inexplicably attempted to navigate between the middle two reefs, Woodhouse and Thomas,” he told Divernet. “The gap here is less than 80m. The ship, with a beam of 32.3m, struck Woodhouse Reef just 50m from its end but went hard on to the top by a distance of around 25m.” Possible explanations are that the ship’s captain thought that there were no more reefs after Jackson, and/or was under the impression that lighthouses on each of Gordon and Jackson were there as a channel guide. After the grounding, Kean and his companions overheard VHF radio communications between the ship’s captain and the authorities. The captain said that no fuel or oil leakages appeared to have occurred, and that pumps were at work to deal with water ingress which was limited to the bow area, due to the ship’s watertight compartments. The Straits of Tiran are popular with scuba divers coming out of Sharm El Sheikh, for the scenic drift diving that can be had in the vicinities of Woodhouse, Jackson, Gordon and Thomas Reefs.
“Navigational error was blamed as a result of VHF radio use to ascertain the intentions of the other ship.”
Source: Divernet.com
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