29.01.2007

Crawler cranes to salvage Napoli containers

A 500 tonner and a 250 tonner crawler cranes have arrived at the wreck of the MSC Napoli on board the Smits barge Bigfoot from Rotterdam. The cranes are being tested before they start offloading the 2,215 containers on board cargo aboard the Napoli a mile off Sidmouth, Devon in the UK.

Fred Caygill, Maritime and Coastguard Agency spokesman, said: "They are going to be doing a test rig and they are hoping to start offloading at first light. The salvage team have a major operation on their hands, not just taking the containers off but taking the oil off as well. They have to make sure it's done safely and the best way possible."

The 500 tonne crane will unload the containers in strict sequence placing them on the Bigfoot, the 250 tonner will then lift them from Bigfoot onto the Boa barge 21 which will take them in batches of 90 at a time to Portland Port where there will be unloaded.
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The sequence for offloading the containers

The process could take up five months according the coastguard due to the precarious nature of the ship.

Napoli suffered hull damage in a mid Channel storm on January 18 when 26 crew were rescued after abandoning ship into a lifeboat. The 62,000-tonne vessel was then grounded in Lyme Bay amid fears she would sink while on tow to Portland, Dorset.
Work to pump the 3,500 tonnes of fuel oil off the ship into a waiting tanker continues round-the-clock.