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Archive -Seychelles

Oil spill at New Port under control |20 April 2018

 

The Seychelles Petroleum Company (Seypec) has confirmed that the oil spill which occurred at the New Port, more precisely at the Mahé Quay South, on Wednesday afternoon was due to a valve burst in one of its fuel pipelines.

Benediste Hoareau, the company’s general manager for protection services, said that Seypec was made aware of the incident at around 2.15pm on Wednesday by the Seychelles Ports Authority, and responded by sending a team on site to evaluate the situation.

“We take all incidents seriously; for us there is no such thing as a big or small incident so we immediately mobilised our people.”

He further stated that the cause of the burst has been linked to a broken gasket and Seypec’s ongoing investigation is expected to determine exactly why the gasket broke.

“There are various elements that could have led to the broken gasket and these include factors such as heat, or else it could have been a defective gasket. Only the investigation can tell,” Mr Hoareau clarified.

The pipeline contained heavy fuel oil used in sea vessels which spilled over into the sea and affected one of the ships that was docked in the port.

According to Mr Hoareau, Seypec and its partners responded swiftly by cutting off the pipeline, pumping out the spill fuel in the pipeline passageway and replacing the broken gasket.

But the majority of the work that needed to be done was marine related and hence they had to install a boom all around the affected area to block the fuel from moving further into the ocean.

Seypec worked in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment, the Seychelles Coast Guard, the police force and the Seychelles Ports Authority to mitigate the issue as much as possible.

Their response included the use of a special marine eco-friendly dispersant to aid in picking the oil spillage.

 “The amount of oil that spilled over into the surrounding sea indicates that the incident occurred only shortly before we were notified,” Mr Hoareau explained.

Although the extent of the pollution caused by the spill was not astronomical, work went on until around midnight.

Seypec, through the contractors it had hired, continued with the clean-up process yesterday morning and this included cleaning the hull of the ship that had been majorly affected by the spill.

It is suspected that the valve burst was worsened by the cement block that had been inserted in one area of the more than 50 metre-long pipeline duct or passageway.

Normally the duct is supposed to act as a receptacle to contain any possible oil that leaks from the fuel pipeline.

But because the cement blocked the passage way, the oil had nowhere else to go but over the wharf and into the ocean.

A press communiqué from the Seychelles Ports Authority acknowledged that the block had been put in place by the authority while they were undertaking certain repair works to the pipeline duct.

“It is unfortunate that this oil spill has happened at the same time that SPA was also undertaking certain repair works to the fuel pipeline duct,” stated the communiqué originating from the office of the Port Environment, Safety and Security manager, Ronny Alcindor.

“As a temporary safety precaution to avoid heavy vehicle from damaging the fuel pipeline, it was a temporary back filled [sic] with sand and concrete barrier,” it continued.

SPA is henceforth undertaking additional works to ensure that the maintenance work to the pipe line duct is completed without any further delay, and Mr Alcindor also relayed that the backfill is going to be removed as soon as possible.

On his part Mr Hoareau stated that Seypec has a quite robust oversight procedure whereby valves and fuel pipes are checked on a daily basis.

“With the risky nature of our business, Seypec cannot afford to compromise on security and safety,” he emphasised.

Investigation on the matter is expected to provide a root cause analysis of the incident as well as establish corrective actions to address any deficiencies found.

“We are also looking into liaising with our partners in order to establish better co-ordination on the port,” Mr Hoareau concluded.

 

 

 

 

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