While the Coast Guard continues to keep an eye for oil spill, if any, from the sunken merchant vessel Princess Miral near Batpady, the district administration continued its mock drill to prevent the spread of oil spill along the coast for the second day on Sunday. There was no headway in defuelling the ship.
The Coast Guard has positioned its fully-equipped Pollution Control Vessel, ICGS Samudra Pavak, which sailed out from Porbandar, for pollution response operation at sea. Nine ships of the Coast Guard and resource agencies and three Coast Guard aircraft are also being used for assessment and monitoring the area of the incident.
As the sunken vessel is close to the shore in Batpady, the Coast Guard has barricaded the Netravathi river mouth from the seaward side using inflatable booms to prevent the spread of oil spill, if any.
On the ground, the district administration continued its mock shore clean-up drill on Sunday on Ullal Beach. Apart from personnel from the State Disaster Response Force and National Disaster Response Force, Firemen, Home Guards, Karnataka State Pollution Control Board and personnel from MRPL, ONGC and other strategic firms were involved in the mock drill.
Local fishermen too were involved in the exercise. The mock drill was conducted by trained staff of Coast Guard.
The trained Coast Guard staff demonstrated how to use different objects to absorb oil deposits coming to the shore and how to dispose it of. The personnel made use of hand gloves, life jackets and shovels for the purpose.
Ullal Tahsildar T.G. Guruprasad said that a few more mock drills will be held in the next few days.
KSPCB Environment Officer Keerti Kumar said that the KSPCB has been testing sea water on a daily basis since June 22 and it has not found any trace of oil discharge.
The ship carrying 8,000 tonnes of steel coil from Tianjin in China to Beirut in Lebanon ran aground five nautical miles off the city on Tuesday last.
The Coast Guard rescued 15 crew members. This vessel sunk on Thursday and it is believed to be holding over 220 tonnes of fuel.
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