OBAD JOHN PAULO

MT3C
June 27,2021

TORREY CANYON OIL SPILL

England (March 1967)

Case Study

The Torrey Canyon disaster in 1967 was the first involving a new generation of
super-tankers and the first major oil spill in British and European waters.

I. Summary of Accident
 Type of accident: Grounding, Oil Pollution
 Name of the vessel: Torrey Canyon (OIL TANKER) A Liberian-registered
tanker
 Date: March 18 1967. 13-15 years for the treated areas to recover, about five
times longer than those areas where the oil was dispersed naturally by wind and
waves
 Place of Aground: TORREY CANYON ran aground on Pollard Rock on the
Seven Stones Reef, near Lands’ End, Cornwall on 18th March 1967
 Fatalities: About 120 miles of the Cornish coast was contaminated by the
massive slick, which killed 15,000 sea birds.
 Pollution: Contaminated 300 kilometers of both England and France.

II. Discussion of the Accident

 In March 1967 when the Torrey Canyon struck a reef off the Isles of Scilly,
119,000 tons of oil polluted the sea. About 120 miles of the Cornish coast was
 contaminated by the massive slick, which killed 15,000 sea birds. But Cornwall's
emergency planning officer has said there are now carefully rehearsed clean-up
 The grasp ordered an alternate of route however that took the deliver, as he
changed into aware, closer to the Seven Stones reef that could be submerged via
way of means of the tide. He planned, and tried, to make changes to his route via
way of means of ordering a tough swing to port however, on the vital time, the
deliver did now no longer respond. No doubt that changed into due to the fact he
had left the deliver on autopilot. Only too past due did he disengage the autopilot
 Torrey Canyon suffered damage to her keel over more than half her length.  And
almost immediately about 30,000 tons of crude oil spilled into the sea
III. Probable causes
 Single hull oil tankers
 It ignored to say that the tanker carried no cruising guidelines for British waters and
that Captain Rugiati said on beyond activities that he had problem with the tanker’s
guidance mechanism
 Vessel channels near the coast or dangerous waters. Some circumstances of the
accident were not investigated at the hearing.
 Navigational Hazards
 Shortcut
IV. Impact
 The disaster occurred in the middle of the migration phase of seabirds, causing
thousands of birds to be oily. As part of rehabilitation measures, only 1% of
infected birds were rescued. An estimated 25,000 birds died from cooking oil,
pneumonia and exposure to harmful cleaning agents The Torrey Canyon
catastrophe turned into the primary to area the risks of dispersant use with inside
the global spotlight. It delivered Europe's interest to a threat that had to date been
overlooked. To reply to this spill, a big amount of dispersant turned into used, as a
right being paid to its ecological impact. In retrospect, it became out that the
oil/dispersant aggregate turned into extra poisonous for the surroundings than the
oil alone
V. Conclusion
After having considered towing the ship out to sea or pumping the remaining oil
out of its tanks, the authorities decided to bomb the vessel and burn the remaining oil
during operations carried out from 28th to 30th March 1967.
The Torrey Canyon incident changed tanker shipping for good. It had a lot of far
reaching consequences with regards to different factors such as the design. Double hull
technology protects in case of low intensity collisions and grounding. But it is still
debatable how much it saves the tanker from spilling oil in a major accident.
References:
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torrey_Canyon_oil_spill
 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-39223308
 https://wwz.cedre.fr/en/Resources/Spills/Spills/Torrey-Canyon