Oil slick threatens Rayong beach
Every effort is being made to prevent an oil slick of 50.000 liters from reaching Mae Ramphung beach in Rayong. Ships have been sent to the disaster site and are spraying solvents over the spot that measures 2,5 km by 800 meters.
The oil comes from a leak 20 kilometers off the coast. It originated early yesterday morning during the transport of oil from a tanker via a buoy to the oil refinery of PTT Global Chemical Plc. Shortly after the leak was discovered, company employees closed the pipeline's valves and placed a 200-meter barrier around the oil.
They started to remove the oil with oil skimmers (a large slotted spoon). The company then deployed four ships. According to Director General Sorasak Saensombat of the Marine Department, ten ships have been sent to the spot. He says it will take a week at the most to clean up all the oil.
A spokesman for the company believes it is possible that the oil will reach Mae Ramphung beach, a popular beach with tourists. Because the wind is now blowing towards the coast, that is not unthinkable.
Director Penchome Sae-Tang of Ecological Alert and Recovery Thailand is concerned about the consequences for the marine environment if cleaning is not done quickly enough.
Wichien Jungrungruang, director general of the Pollution Control Department, has the impression that the clean-up operation is going according to plan and is progressing well. According to another hotemetoot, 30 to 40 percent of the slick cleaned up.
(Source: Bangkok Post, July 28, 2013)
Deploying a BOOM, a floating oil barrier with skimmers (these are not skimmers, don't even look like them) Rayong Refinery and Star refinery have quickly deployable booms of a few hundred meters that can be deployed in a short time with a tugboat. You have to ask for it. There is also an EARL rapid response team that can be called up. The use of dispersants is of course not good because it affects marine life. Also watch out now with the locally caught fish, shrimps etc.
@Marcus If skimmers aren't some kind of skimmers then what are they? I like to read that. A person is never too old to learn. I thought of skimmers because I have seen Shell in the port of Vlaardingen clean up oil that had leaked from Pernis and floated to the other side. That ship scooped up the slick.
Regards, Dick
There are different methods. I have worked with floating skimmers that run or pump the top layer, i.e. the oil, into a “bladder” tank. There are also sponge-like snakes that absorb oil and are then continuously wrung out (endless snake that goes around, into the sea, sucks it up, and then out again to be wrung out).
You also have those ships, such as the “little fisherman” long ago in Pernis, the petroleum harbours, which with protruding wings at an angle and sailing slowly send the oil to an opening in the hull. Water that enters is pumped out again. But a tree to hold it together is important, possibly with a very large magnet clamp against the hull of the leaking ship. Going through it with many ships is of course not good because that will emulsify and spread the oil.
Boom is a floating oil barrier, floating devices at the top, a skirt with weights at the bottom.
Bladder tank is a very large heavy balloon, 20 cubic feet or so, that floats at 5 percent or so above the water.
When I read this.
More work to be done for the Dutch.
We are still the best to solve these problems .
But are often , or not asked or much too late .
Think of Smit branch , Weismuller and other companies .
I still believe in Dutch glory.
The Thai really can't do this.
Mvg Jantje.
Although you wouldn't expect it, oil is one of the most important pillars of the Thai economy.
The Thai fat necks will care more about the loss of 50.000 liquid money and the clean-up costs.
If the damage to the environment and the tourists they are now missing out on.