A cargo ship hit a tanker carrying jet fuel for the U.S. military off eastern England on Monday, setting both vessels ablaze and sending fuel pouring into the North Sea.
All 37 crew members aboard the vessels were safe and accounted for, with one hospitalized, local lawmaker Graham Stuart said. The collision triggered a major rescue operation by lifeboats, coast guard aircraft and commercial vessels.
Stuart said he was concerned about the “potential ecological impact” of the spill, whose cause was being investigated by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch.
The U.S.-flagged chemical and oil products tanker MV Stena Immaculate was at anchor near the port of Grimsby on Monday morning after sailing from Greece, according to ship-tracking site VesselFinder. The Portugal-flagged container ship Solong was sailing from Grangemouth in Scotland to Rotterdam in the Netherlands when it struck the side of the tanker.
U.S.-based maritime management firm Crowley, which operates the Stena Immaculate, said the tanker “sustained a ruptured cargo tank containing Jet-A1 fuel,” when the container ship struck it, triggering a fire and “multiple explosions onboard,” with fuel released into the sea.
It said all 23 mariners on the tanker were safe and accounted for.
The Stena Immaculate was operating as part of the U.S. government’s Tanker Security Program, a group of commercial vessels that can be contracted to carry fuel for the military when needed.
Britain’s Maritime and Coastguard Agency said the alarm was raised at 9:48 a.m. Humber Coast Guard asked vessels with firefighting equipment and those who could help with search and rescue to head to the scene about 155 miles north of London.
Video footage aired by British broadcasters and apparently filmed from a nearby vessel showed thick black smoke pouring from both ships.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said details of the collision and its cause “are still becoming clear.”
Abdul Khalique, head of the Maritime Center at Liverpool John Moores University, said it appeared the crew of the cargo ship had not been “maintaining a proper lookout by radar” as required by international maritime regulations.
Greenpeace U.K. said it was too early to assess the extent of any environmental damage from the collision, which took place in a busy fishing ground and close to major seabird colonies.
Scientists said the environmental impact might be less severe than with a spill of heavier crude oil.
“Whilst the images look worrying, from the perspective of the impact to the aquatic environment, it’s less of a concern than if this had been crude oil because most of the jet fuel will evaporate very quickly,” said Mark Hartl of the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Biotechnology at Scotland’s Heriot-Watt University.
Mark Sephton, professor of organic geochemistry at Imperial College London, said jet fuel disintegrates more quickly than crude oil, and warmer temperatures speed biodegradation.
“In the end, it all depends on the rate of introduction of fuel and the rate of destruction by bacteria,” he said. “Let’s hope the latter wins out.”
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