Oil spill in the sunderbans : Scenes from ground zero How A Massive Oilspill Is Damaging The Sundarbans It was 5am as we set off from Chandpai forest station, heading south into the Sundarbans. A thick dark fog hung sullenly about us. A few kilometers on, visibility beyond the prow fell to near zero, forcing us to dock mid-river. As we waited, voices rang out from somewhere in the thick blur: fishermen singing to semaphore their presence. Occasionally a low dinghy would row quietly by, unseen until it was almost upon us. In the distance, a ship boomed its approach. Our boat master shook his head in concern. In such poor visibility, we’d stand no chance if we stood in its path. He revved up the engine and guided us into a khal (a channel). 5am on December 9, 2014 must have been just such a scene. The Oil Tanker Southern Star -7 was docked four kilometers from the confluence of the rivers Sela and Passur, near Mrigamari in dense fog. It carried 350,000 liters of heavy black viscous furnace oil. The fog must have been at its darkest and alertness at its dullest when a cargo ship, also plying the same channel, loomed unexpectedly upon the tanker. The Southern Star-7 stood no chance. When the cargo ship rammed into it, it nose-dived its cargo into the Sela River. The Sela is part of the Sundarbans, the largest unbroken stand of mangrove forests in the world. A UNESCO World Heritage Site. A fragile ecosystem that has adapted itself to life on the brink of brine, for these mangroves form the margin between the salt water of the Bay of Bengal and the freshwaters of three mighty South Asian rivers: The Ganges, the Brahmaputra, and the Meghna.
Posted on: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 11:37:58 +0000
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