World | Philippines
Oil theft may have caused spill
Maritime officials said they are looking at the possibility that the crew of the ill-fated tanker Solar I had been pilfering oil on rough seas when the country's worst oil spill occurred.
- By Gilbert Felongco, Correspondent
- Published: 00:00 September 8, 2006
Manila: Maritime officials said they are looking at the possibility that the crew of the ill-fated tanker Solar I had been pilfering oil on rough seas when the country's worst oil spill occurred.
"We are not discounting that possibility, in fact it is one of the strongest angles being looked at by the coast guard and the Maritime Industry Authority [Marina] as the explanation why Solar I sank," a coast guard official said.
Another vessel
The coast guard official requested anonymity so as not to jeopardise ongoing investigations into the August 11 accident that led to the spilling of an estimated 500,000 litres of bunker fuel in the Guimaras Strait in central Philippines.
The coast guard official said it is "highly likely" that the crew of the 998-metric-ton Solar I were in the process of transferring pilfered oil from its tanks to another vessel when the mishap occurred near the coast of Guimaras.
"This will probably explain why some of the cargo hatches of the ship were open when an underwater video of the sunken wreck was taken by a Japanese salvage team last week," the official said.
The official added that local tanker crews were notorious for pilfering oil.
"Recently, crew members of two tankers were arrested by Maritime police in Manila after they were found carrying pilfered oil from a ship that came from Mariveles in Bataan province," he said.
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