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New Zealand speeds up Rena clean-up
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CNTV, October 23, 2011
Salvors resumed pumping fuel Thursday from a cargo ship grounded on a New Zealand reef as a new poll indicated deep public dissatisfaction with the government and shipping authorities for their handling of the environmental disaster.
Thousands of birds have believed to have died after an estimated 350 tonnes of oil and 88 cargo containers fell into the sea following the grounding of the 47,000-tonne Rena on the Astrolabe Reef, about 12 nautical miles offshore near the port of Tauranga, on Oct. 5.
Salvors resumed pumping Thursday after poor weather ended the operation earlier in the week, but the exact amount of fuel pumped from the ship Thursday was not available, according to Maritime New Zealand (MNZ).
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Wildlife experts believe many more birds may have died at sea and sunk. [CNTV] |
MNZ salvage unit manager Bruce Anderson said a booster pump was also reinstalled to speed up pumping, but a circuit blow-out required a back-up booster pump to be installed.
"The salvors have contingency upon contingency for situations like these. A backup booster pump has been brought in and the existing pump will have the circuit repaired," said Anderson.
Divers had entered the ship through a submerged corridor to investigate the seals of the starboard-side engine room manhole to prepare for a cofferdam (an enclosure to create a dry work environment) to allow access to the starboard-side fuel tanks, he said
Twenty-nine of the 88 containers lost overboard had been accounted for, said a statement from MNZ.
The Oiled Wildlife Response Unit had 288 birds in care and a total of 1,323 birds had been brought to the center.
Wildlife experts believe many more birds may have died at sea and sunk.
MNZ national on-scene commander Ian Niblock said the army, volunteers and community groups had collected more than 800 bags of oiled waste from beaches around Tauranga, but the beaches would remain closed to the public as oil was still coming in on the surf.
Meanwhile, results of a poll released Thursday showed 65 percent of New Zealanders feel more could have been done earlier to avoid the loss of fuel from the Liberian-flagged Rena and the resulting pollution.
New Zealanders also gave the government, Prime Minister John Key and Transport Minister Stephen Joyce poor performance ratings for their management of the issue, according to the RadioLive- HorizonPoll.
The perceived poor handling of the crisis, which saw oil recovery from the ship start almost five days after it ran aground could costing the government 2.7 percent of its voter support in next month's general election.
The poll of 1,961 people showed 46.8 percent of respondents rated the Key's performance on the incident as poor to very poor, while 27.9 percent rated it good to very good, and 18.4 percent were neutral and 6.9 percent did not know.
The national shipping authority, Maritime New Zealand, received a performance rating of 39.8 percent poor, 30.7 percent good.
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