Tanker wreck clears three villages
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• Emergency authorities were this week trying to find out how two road tank trailers containing poisonous gas were washed ashore off Norfolk, causing the evacuation of three villages.
Norfolk police say four tanker trailers were washed overboard from the Belgian ferry Nordic Pride on 3 May — two were still unaccounted for and might have sunk. The ferry was bound for Immingham in Humberside.
As CM went to press on Tuesday the emergency services were attempting to lay a temporary road on the shingle beach at Weybourne to allow the contents of the tankers, which belong to chemicals giant BASF, to be transferred into other road tankers and removed.
The eight-wheel 24-tonne tanker trailers each contained 24,000 litres of ethyl acrylate which is used in the paint industry.
Norfolk police say 40 people were sent to hospital after feeling unwell following the spillage but none were detained.
The chemical can cause skin irritation and breathing difficulties and police say the situation could have been "more serious" if they had not evacuated up to 1,000 residents from Salthouse, Kelling and Weybourne. A twomile exclusion zone was set up.
It is not known how the tankers came adrift from the Nordic Pride, but the FTA says that because ethyl acrylate is inflammable it is likely to have been stored on deck, in line with the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code (IMDG). "There are general requirements for the load to be fully secured," it says.
The emergency services were co-ordinating action from a Sheringham school as CM went to press. Reports of distressed birds on the beach are being dealt with by the Marine Life Rescue Service. Harry Nickerson, director of Marine Life Rescue at Bacton, is worried about the fate of several hundred seabirds which have been feeding off the North Norfolk coast, as well as seal colonies in the area: "If chemicals have escaped into the sea it may be weeks before we know the extent of damage to marine life," he says.
BASF is co-operating with the police, coastguard, fire brigade and pollution experts in attempts to limit environmental damage. "We accept the two tankers on the beach are ours but we do not know who owns the two that' re missing," it says. On Tuesday evening coastguards were warning shipping to keep watch for them.
The police do not yet know if leakage from one of the tankers on its side is due to a faulty valve or a rupture. But a spokesman says "attempts are being made to block the valves while contractors lay a temporary road on the beach".
The army will be brought in to help clear the chemical.
Evacuees were preparing for another night away from home as CM went to press: they were due to return home yesterday (Wednesday).
The police say it is too early to comment on the likelihood of a prosecution.