The tuk-tuk
(motorised rickshaw) buzzed down the main street of Chittagong, Bangladesh,
with the animated ship’s agent tucked in beside me, hands in the air and
talking like a used car salesmen keen for me to buy.
I had
dreamed about this trip, and here I was, on a special mission for the company
who had employed me to go to this most famous place where ships go to die and I
was to pick through some of the specialist parts for our fleet.
Anything we
could want was going to be here. As a marine engineer, I was like a kid in a
candy store yet confused as to where to start to devour what was on offer.
Chittagong
is a mammoth wrecking yard for ship spare parts.
This is the
biggest vessel graveyard in the world and yet, just like a hospital that
carries out organ donations, it is one of the biggest spare parts centres that
keeps the rest of the world’s fleet sailing.
This was no
simple jaunt out to the bay to watch the hundreds of ship recyclers at work on
the aged and purposely beached ships, manually pulling the vessels apart with
the aid of an onshore winch (with the scene putting the picture of honey-soaked
bread slowly being demolished into parts by ants carried away).
This journey
was like driving down a giant supermarket aisle that went on for kilometres, as
every spare piece of road was solidly packed with ship’s toilets, anchors,
auxiliary engines, pipes and steel, cables and cupboards.
A small
creek of water, dribbling from the Karnaphuli River, carried the weight of
hundreds of tenders (small service boats) that spilled onto the banks like a
pod of orange beached whales.
The nearby
township of PaarTuri was a hive of shipping part shops with locals crouched
over a recently recycled ship part, polishing it up and getting it ready for
sale.
I was
fortunate enough to visit Chittagong a few more times in the following years
and each time, I was amazed at how every part of a ship can be utilised,
re-engineered and sent back to sea.
Alternatively,
it is turned into a new vessel in a bay, right next to the area where the ships
are destroyed. However, it’s not only amazing memories and photographs that are
left behind from such a journey.
Ship
scrapping activities pollute the seawater environment in the coastal area, with
Bangladesh particularly affected.
It leaves
behind an enormous amount of discharge into the marine environment including
asbestos, heavy metals, oils, metal fragments and chemicals.
Shipbreaking
activities contaminate the coastal soil and sea water environment through the
discharge of ammonia, burned oil spillage, floatable grease balls, metal rust
(iron) and various other disposable refuse materials together with high
turbidity of sea water.
It’s a
killer soup. In 2009, to improve ship recycling conditions, the Hong Kong
Convention was adopted by the International Maritime Organization and
corresponding guidelines followed. However, the convention has been ratified by
only three countries.
In 2014, the
ship recycling debate was reinvigorated by the European Union drafting new
requirements for ship recycling facilities.
These will
enter into force in the coming years.
Last year,
out of a total of 1026 ships dismantled globally in 2014, 74 per cent of the
gross tonnage – or some 641 vessels – were sold to ‘sub-standard facilities’ in
India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
WHAT DOES IT
MEAN FOR US IN FIJI AND OUR PRISTINE WATERS?
Next week, a
team of visiting Korean students will undergo a course through Fiji Maritime
Academy (FMA) to take home a better understanding of Marine Environment
Awareness.
The course
is designed to introduce awareness of the maritime environment and examine the
present day to threats to the oceans and marine life.
The focus is
to discuss the human element that contributes to pollution especially in world
shipping and look at the measures taken to safeguard the precious marine
environment.
What of
places like Chittagong, Bangladesh?
While the industry is concerned about Green Peace and other
environmentalist groups forcing change it hasn’t happened yet and hundreds of
thousands of people are reliant on that industry for their livelihood.
It’s a tough
ethical situation and one that our young seafarers will be forced to confront
as they continue to travel the oceans, faced with the harsh realities of how
fragile our seas and oceans are yet needing to balance the human element and
its need economic needs.
Source: Fiji
Sun. 29 July 2015
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