“Shipbreaking” # 31
Bulletin of information and analysis on ship demolition
Europe is sending illegally more and more vessels to be broken up in Asia. She is not the only one doing this way.
In this edition :
– Overview January 1 to April 30, 2013
– MSC Flaminia
– Baco-Liner
– Marseille, the waiting room for scrapping in Asia
– The scandalous export of the Lyubov Orlova
– Welcome to Chennai Port, the Nightmare before Scrapping
– Letters to the Editor
– France Telecom cable layer Chamarel
“Shipbreaking” # 30 – The Ship Demolition World Tour
– The final 2012 sprint, p 6
– 2012, a record year, p 7
293 ships in 2006
1328 in 2012
– already broken up, but heading for demolition ! p 1
– ships without place of refuge, p 4
– a regular visitor to the Belgian Congo to be scrapped in Lithuania, p 67
The Cruising industry Hits the Wall
Costa Concordia – Press release # 5
The refloating of the Costa Concordia should have taken place at the end of 2012, followed by its removal to a port of demolition (or to a submarine graveyard?) in January of 2013. The work of the Italian-American consortium between Titan Salvage and Micoperi was estimated at a cost of 300 million US$. Complications arose with the project and both the time and budget were drawn out. The unforeseen hardness of the undersea granite slows down the setting up of the platform needed to remove the ship. The workers and the Italian authorities are now looking at retrieval in 2014. In the meantime, the wreck on the rocks experiences the pressure of the sea on its exterior and the one of 100,000 tons of polluted water on its interior. The risk of the ship dislodging is increasing. Should the removal of the ship take place according to plan, two key points demand clarification: 1. The methods of treating the water and waste on the interior of the wreck, and 2. The destination of the wreck. Italy has not displayed the ability to properly dismantle ships. The Costa Allegra was sent to the junk-yard in Turkey (1). The transport ferry Repubblica di Amalfi from Grimaldi Lines is still awaiting demolition in India. Thirty-seven ships belonging to Italian companies such as Ignazio Messina, Stradeblu, BM Shipping and SNAV headed for the junk-yard in 2012. Not a single one was demolished in Italy: 19 went to India, 10 to Turkey and 7 to Bangladesh.
“Shipbreaking”: An editorial success by Robin des Bois
The 29th publication of Ship-breaking.com is available (64 pages – 5,2 Mo)
This quarterly publication is an information bulletin and analysis on the demolition of vessels, Ship-breaking.com is read by thousands of specialists across the globe. The letters to the editor section point to the fact that the international public of Ship-breaking.com increases year after year.
The first edition of Ship-breaking.com was published in February 2006 in order for Robin des Bois to better understand the lifecycle of commercial ships and military vessels following the Clemenceau aircraft carrier affair. On this subject Ship-breaking.com has shown that exporting military vessels to Asia for demolition seems to be fixed in stone. Ship-breaking.com n°29 underlines this with the examples of the Russian cruiser Murmansk and the British frigate HMS Plymouth.
Fessenheim : To be shut down or not ?
In any event, an immediate decision on the closure or continued operation of the nuclear center in Fessenheim is imperative. Fessenheim does not make tea. Operators and contractors are responsible for handling of radioactive fuel and monitoring of nuclear fission. The staff has been under pressure for a year now, which is absolutely inconsistent with the serenity and concentration required when working at a nuclear plant. Prolonging the uncertainty is irresponsible of the government.
The handling, storing, and transport of hydrogen peroxide leads to many accidents and releases of exothermic vapors that have could potentially cause burns to employees and first-aid attendants every year. Such accidents occur in paper mills, agribusiness, and water purification centers.
