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Jealous? Shanghai salvage bureau's bid to salvage the sunken ship is questioned
Shanghai's salvage bureau has won the contract to salvage the x-Press Pearl, a sunken container ship that caught fire off Sri Lanka, but the government's involvement in China's "national team" has raised concerns among overseas commercial salvage companies.
The Shanghai Salvage Bureau won the bid to clean up the x-Press Pearl, raising concerns about the government's background
Sri Lankan Justice Minister Ali Sabry said the Shanghai Salvage Bureau would take charge of removing the x-Press Pearl from Sri Lankan waters, while Resolve Marine, a Florida-based rescue company, would also take part in the operation to clean up the ship's supplies, local media reported. The salvage costs will be paid for by the X-Press Pearl's insurance company.
But some foreign commercial rescuers see the Bureau's participation in the salvage tender as a worrying development because the bureau is a government entity that has access to Chinese government resources when submitting bids, "akin to the US Coast Guard bidding for salvage contracts".
It is understood that Shanghai Salvage Bureau (China Ocean Engineering Shanghai Corporation) was established in 1951, under the Ministry of Transport of China, is one of the largest rescue and salvage professional units in China. At present, Shanghai Salvage Bureau has 50 tugboats and special vessels of various types. Over the past years, it has rescued more than 20,000 people, rescued about 2,000 vessels, salvaged more than 1,200 sunken ships and objects, and removed 26,500 tons of pollution sources and chemicals from the sea in emergency response.
Shanghai Salvage Bureau has participated in the exploration of the sunken ship "Yuejin", China's first domestic 10,000-ton freighter, the construction of yongshu Reef observation station in Nansha and the construction of Donghai Bridge. The rescue and salvage missions of "Abowan" in Pingtan, Fujian province, "Yinchu" in Huangpu River, "Zhongchang 118" in Wusongkou, "Aosheng 65" in Tianjin Port and "Dashun" in Bohai Bay have been completed. It has carried out the salvage of the bodies of the victims of Xiaolangdi in the Yellow River, the rescue of the Passenger ship "Oriental Star" in the Yangtze River Channel, the emergency salvage of a bus from Chongqing wanzhou River, and the world-famous sunken ferry "Sewol" in the Rok
It is worth mentioning that in May last year, the world's leading salvage company withdraw from the market, Ardent have speculated that, according to foreign media analysis maritime salvage market demand decreases, the cost is increased, and headed by Shanghai bureau of China salvage price pressures rise (CRS), all of these factors may be the cause of Ardent termination of business.
At the time, analysts noted that China Salvage, the country's only national professional salvage force, was bidding for large shipwreck cleanup contracts. Compared with commercial salvage companies, China Salvage has deep financial resources unmatched by commercial salvage companies and can absorb delays and cost overruns. The emergence of China salvage brings fierce competition to Marine salvage market and makes many old salvage companies lose competitiveness in price.
In fact, the "Sewol" sunken ship salvage work has brought huge losses to the Shanghai salvage bureau. In 2017, Huanqiu quoted South Korean media as saying that in 2015, Shanghai Salvage Bureau took over the contract to salvage the Sunken ferry Sewol of South Korea. The initial contract value was 85.1 billion won, but the contract value was increased to 91.6 billion won (about 530 million yuan). However, as the salvage operation was delayed, the Shanghai Salvage Bureau incurred 280 billion won (1.619 billion yuan) in actual expenses and lost nearly 1.1 billion yuan after the salvage operation was completed in 2017.
The X-Press Pearl sank just three months before it was delivered
The x-Press Pearl caught fire while moored 9.5 nautical miles off Colombo harbor in May. The fire was brought under control but then exploded out of control. When the fire was largely out, rescuers tried to tow the ship when its stern hit the seabed and it sank.
The x-press Pearl, owned by x-press Feeders, is a 2700TEU container ship built by zhoushan changhong international and just delivered in February. It is 186m long, 34.8m wide and 17.9m deep. It is classed DNV and flies the Singapore flag. It serves x-Press Feeders on its Asian route. Since delivery, the X-Press Pearl has sailed the route only three times.
he X-Press Pearl was carrying 1, 486 containers, 81 of them dangerous goods, including 25 tons of nitric acid, several other chemicals and cosmetics. Initial estimates suggest that the fire was caused by a nitric acid leak in containers that had been loaded onto ships at Jebel Ali port in Dubai, bound for Malaysia.
The x-Press Pearl lost most of its cargo in a fire that spilled chemicals and plastic particles, causing serious Marine pollution in Sri Lanka.
After nearly half a year of efforts, Sri Lanka has removed about 650 tons of plastic particles from its beaches. The Sri Lankan government is still conducting an environmental damage assessment of the impact of the sinking, which is expected to be completed by January at the latest. At that time, the Sri Lankan government will file additional environmental claims against x-Press Feeders, the owner of the X-Press Pearl.
The insurance company for the X-Press Pearl had already paid a first payment of $3.6 million to the Sri Lankan government, of which $1.6 million had been allocated to local fishing groups directly affected by the pollution.
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