Storm Leaves Rena Intact

The stranded container vessel Rena is still intact after the weekend's stormy weather at the New Zealand coast. Electronic sensors monitoring the movement of the wreck indicated some extra movement during last night's swells, but salvor company Svitzer advises there was nothing untoward in the readings. The rough weather resulted in the release of a small amount of weathered oil from under the wreck on Saturday night. 

 

 

The release of the oil may result in some light oiling reaching beaches between Pâpâmoa and Mount Maungaui. Members of the public may see sticky tar balls reach the shoreline.

 

Salvage teams resume work on installing patches in the passages on Rena, to improve buoyancy.

No container removal operations were undertaken over the weekend due to high swells. Container removal operations are not expected to resume for the next day or so.

 

A total of 167 containers have been removed from Rena. There were 1368 containers on board when Rena ran aground, and an estimated 87 were washed overboard on 12th October 2011, leaving 1114 on board today.

 

The crane barge Smit Borneo is expected to arrive from Singapore around 11am today. The barge will remain in port for several days while the barge is prepared for container removal. The Sea Tow 60 is also in port. The anchor handling tug Go Canopus remains attached to Rena.

 

Winds are blowing north easterly at about 15 knots, shifting to northwest today with low cloud and swells of a maximum 4m. Another weather spike is expected Tuesday night and wet weather is set to continue for the next few days.

 

Shoreline Clean Up Assessment Teams are checking the beaches on Monday 5^th December 2011 and clean-up crews will be working at Mount Maunganui, Pâpâmoa and Matakana Island.

 

Container recovery specialists Braemar Howells advise that the rough weather could result in some debris from containers reaching shorelines.