Gerhard Gavilnez

The oil spill Prestige

The Prestige disaster refers to the Prestige accident and subsequent collapse in 2002 and the
oil spill caused and affected 2,000 kilometers of Spanish and French coast.

The November 13, 2002, the single-hull tanker Prestige crashed in a storm while transiting
loaded with 77,000 tonnes of fuel oil off the coast of Death, in northwestern Spain, and
after several days of maneuvering for departure from Galician coast is sinking over 250 km
of it. The dumping of the load caused one of the biggest environmental disasters in the
history of navigation, therefore the amount of pollutants released as by the extent of the
affected area, an area ranging from northern Portugal to the Landes of France.

Why it happened
the hull breach was due to fatigue of the materials to the stakes of the sea, causing a crack
in the starboard side that hit the cargo tanks. This crack, which at first was estimated about
15 meters, was expanded to reach 35 meters following day. Another possible explanation is
the release of an iron hull of the ship, which would have followed other detachments as the
days progressed. The boat, 26 years old, was in very poor condition


















Responsibles
The November 13, 2013, after nine months of trial, the Superior Court of Justice of Galicia
settled the case without blame, as none of the accused was found guilty of environmental
crime.
He condemned the captain, Apostolos Mangouras for an offense of grave disobedience to
the Spanish authorities during the rescue operation, which earned him a sentence of nine
months in jail for which he never went to prison.
Gerhard Gavilnez

Impacts
Different experts predicted that marine life would suffer pollution from the Prestige for a
minimum of ten years due to the type of discharge, mainly due to its content of aromatic
hydrocarbons. These compounds, cumulative toxic action, can poison plankton and fish
eggs, crustaceans, and producing carcinogenic effects in fish and the animals that feed on
them in the food chain. They were also attributed mutagenic effects.

The consequences of the spill on the Galician ecosystems were studied by different
government agencies, universities and environmental groups. The most studied sector was
the amount of the avifauna, both for being the best known before and after the accident, and
the decreased social media and perceived sensitivity on other wildlife, as in the plankton
and marine invertebrates.

The truth is that there was a notable lack of recent animals before the Prestige spill,
preventing adequately assess changes that may have suffered as a result of the spill,
whether it declines in population or geographic distribution. Therefore, the potential impact
of the oil spill on invertebrates, molluscs, crustaceans or invertebrates that are not subject to
fishing-or operation on fish must be based on assumptions about the anticipated effects of
fuel oil on the various living beings: direct mortality contact with fuel or indirect effects by
disrupting ecosystems, as the change in the structure of ecological communities and altered
interaction networks between different species and between predators and prey.























Gerhard Gavilnez
Degree of the damages
High environmental impact, direct affectations microorganisms, which affects the trophic
chain, plus affectation in the reproduction of the same



Mitigation measurements applied after the event to mitigate the impacts
The cleanup spill fuel oil reached both at sea and on the coasts and the remaining in the
wreck; also had to clean many oiled birds.

The success of the cleanup campaign was due, although discrepancies, the efforts of
volunteers, sailors and the Administration, they secured the following summer the fuel
alone would affect significantly the coast between Cape Corrubedo and Ortegal.

Different surveys in the seabed confirmed the presence of fuel, sometimes buried under
sediment. The experts recognized that neither the amount nor the distribution was not
known, but argued that the heavier and less toxic part of the fuel oil spill, asphaltenes
matched.

















Conclusions
So far there has not been a guilty of this disaster, the damage that has been done is very
large so that have passed more than 10 years and still can not finish cleaning the affected
areas, besides the impact caused spices inhabiting this area