The New York Times-20080125-Accident Closes Major Shipping Channel for Hours
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Accident Closes Major Shipping Channel for Hours
A 669-foot tank ship carrying orange juice collided with a smaller dredging ship in Newark Bay on Thursday, forcing the Coast Guard to close a waterway that leads to some of the largest shipping terminals on the East Coast for about five hours.
No one was injured in the collision, but the smaller ship, the 117-foot Dredge New York, took on water and started to sink before it was stabilized. The Coast Guard found a sheen of light hydraulic fluid in the surrounding water, but investigators had not determined its source.
Several Coast Guard helicopters and boats with investigators were at the site, according to Petty Officer Angelia Rorison, a spokeswoman for the Coast Guard in New York. She added that the hydraulic fluid spill did not appear serious and that no other major pollutants were found.
The collision, Officer Rorison said, occurred about 1:50 p.m. near Port Newark, on the west side of a channel between Bayonne, N.J., and Newark. The freighter, Orange Sun, which was flying a Liberian flag, collided with the dredging vessel, and several hours later, the ship was escorted by tugboats to Berth 24 at Port Newark. The dredging vessel was linked to a barge and tugboat after water was removed from the ship.
The dredging vessel was working on a $2.5 billion project to deepen New York Harbor and the surrounding channels to 50 feet, from 45 feet, to allow bigger container ships to dock in New York and New Jersey.
The damaged vessel was owned by Great Lakes Dredge and Dock Company, which is based in Chicago. After the accident, Great Lakes hired a salvage crew, which sent divers to the scene to repair the damaged ship. The crew sealed off the area where the ship was taking on water.
The Dredge New York is the largest excavator of its kind in the country, according to Hal Hawkins, the manager for the project with the Army Corps of Engineers, which is working on behalf of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
[Illustration]PHOTO: The Orange Sun traveled under the Bayonne Bridge on Thursday after it hit a dredging vessel. (PHOTOGRAPH BY MIKE DERER/ASSOCIATED PRESS)