Govt agencies to sue for US$15 million for reef damage
The full extent of the damage caused when a cargo vessel went aground, has been described as one of the worst ever to our reefs, the longest living in the world. And while varying figures on damages have been thrown around, the Ports Commissioner has confirmed that the Port will be suing the ship owners for fifteen million dollars, US that is, for damages caused to the reefs due to negligence of the operators of the Westerhaven. Jose Sanchez reports.
Jose Sanchez, Reporting
Since the Westerhaven ran aground about fifteen miles Northeast of Dangriga on Tuesday night, several agencies including the Belize Ports Authority, the Department of Environment and the Fisheries Department have been coordinating their efforts to assess environmental damages as well as legal ones. Melanie McField, the marine scientist who recorded the damage firsthand with her underwater camera, believes that legislation specific to reefs needs to be established.
Melanie McField, Marine Scientist
“I think we need something specific for this like a coral reef protection act. We don’t have something really specific to the reef. In the fisheries act there is a clause that says we will not take, buy or sell any coral without a permit and that’s why the black coral harvesters get a permit. And they can try to use that; we can try to assess how many corals were damaged by looking at the size of the area and how many living coral animals are in an equivalent size just next to it so we could estimate how many corals were damaged. But the fine is really low. If we use that case, it would be like five hundred dollars a coral and that’s just crazy. So the other way of doing it is just the habitat loss and that’s under the Environmental Protection Act. And showing that there was negligence, which clearly there was negligence in not following your—in my opinion it’s navigation equipment we have now, someone should have been watching the equipment and they would have known they were getting close to the reef. That’s why I can’t understand if the boat was being monitored by the crew, I don’t understand how it could run onto the reef like that.”
Beverly Wade, Fisheries Administrator
“Currently, my staff is out there at one of the spawning aggregation sites—that’s a reserve—doing our annual monitoring. Unfortunately, this grounding is five hundred feet from that site, so it is a sensitive area for us. They were out there and we got some preliminary reports from them.”
Jose Sanchez
“Safe to say it doesn’t look good?”
Beverly Wade
“No, it doesn’t. I must agree with Dr. McField its’ the worst grounding that we have seen in Belize, well that I have seen in my professional tenure. It really doesn’t look good and it’s a highly sensitive area, as I said before. It’s an area where there is spawning aggregation and it’s an area where there are healthy reefs in that area.”
The Department of Environment says it does not understand how this incident occurred. That is why they have sought technical assistance from their sister agency, the Fisheries Department.
Beverly Wade
“The Fisheries Department’s role is primarily to provide technical assistance to the Department of Environment. We have a cadre of well trained individuals who will now go about doing the assessment for the Department of the Environment and we are hopeful that we could carry that out early next week. We had planned to go out there this week but unfortunately, the weather has prevented us from doing so. So we’re basically going out there next week and we’re going to carry out a full assessment of the damaged area so that we could now present that report to the Department of the Environment and they could then inform their process of formalizing what the damages are and to inform their charges.”
Melanie McField
“It’s about a hundred meters long, little bit less that the width. So if you say a hundred times two thousand, that’s twenty million.”
That rough estimate given two days ago by McField is close to the fifteen million U.S. in damages that the Ports Authority is currently filing for damages in the courts.
Major Lloyd Jones, Ports Commissioner, BPA
“The preliminary assessment has been done by the Department of Environment. I have spoken only a couple hours ago with Mr. Algeria and he has given me something in writing which says that from his preliminary assessment, the damage is estimated at a little over fifteen million U.S. dollars. Our attorney has been instructed to commence legal action. We have filed an action in rem in the Supreme Court and we’ve asked the Supreme Court for a warrant to arrest the ship. I believe that that has been filed by our attorney some time before three today. I’m awaiting word from them as to how that went but we foresee no problem in getting that arrest warrant.”
“The master was alone on the bridge at the time of the grounding which is absolutely unacceptable. It flies in the face of accepted norms of safe navigation and we intend to pursue that matter. He alleges that he engaged the autopilot and we are wondering if that is the case, why did the alarm not sound when the autopilot diverted from its intended course or if it sounded, why didn’t anybody hear that alarm. I’m of the view that is certainly something that could have been prevented if only the crew had stuck to international norms with respect to with safety of navigation. If you were to look at the chart, there is absolutely no reason why that ship should have gone aground, absolutely none other than, like I said, inattentiveness or carelessness on the part of the crew. It is wide open waters, there are no navigational hazard other than the barrier reef on both side, but you have clear open water for miles. So any mariner that is competent in navigation should have been able to navigate that area safely.”
The ship won’t be on the reef for much longer. A U.S. based team with tugboats is on its way to dislodge the Westerhaven from the reef on Monday. The ports commissioner says the ship will be impounded with its cargo. Our news team will accompany the agencies to see how it unfolds. Reporting for News Five, Jose Sanchez.
The current plight of the Westerhaven has raised many questions about maritime laws. There is a particular one that environmentalists keep asking. That is…do the laws of Belize specify what distance a ship must keep from the reef when chartering through our waters? That is what News Five’s Jose Sanchez asked Ports Commissioner Major Lloyd Jones today.
Major Lloyd Jones, Ports Commissioner, B.P.A.
“Currently for a foreign vessel to visit Belize they need to file what is called a notice of arrival for the Port Authority. That tells us that the vessel is coming in. Belize is compulsory pilotage waters. In the case of a vessel coming to Belize City, that vessel would take on a pilot just outside of English Caye and that pilot brings it in and takes it out. That was done and thereafter the pilot disembarked and the master then was left to do the southern transit on his own. That has been going on, as I far as I know, for many, many years and unless there are particular hazards, then the pilot would then disembark.”
“Currently, the law does not specify what distance you have to stay clear of our barrier reef and so on and certainly that is one of the things that we believe, in discussing with the stakeholders, that we might want to implement. It is called internationally as a ship routing system so that we say, as a matter law, that if you enter Belize just for the sake of argument, you cannot navigate anywhere within two miles, three miles, whatever it is that would be recommended unless, of course, you’re entering port. That would then require ships to stay clear of a particular area. But even if we were to have that legislation, the responsibility to ensure that you don’t go within that area still rests with the crew and I think that is where were having some fundamental issues and I think that is something that we will certainly have to address.”
