On May 12 the port of Olhão is to host an exercise to demonstrate how the Algarve will react to oil pollution hitting the Algarve's pristine shoreline.
‘Olhão 2016’ is being jointly organised by the Southern Region of the National Maritime Department, The National Protection Autority, Olhão council and Docapesca.
Olhão 2016 has three main objectives to combat pollution at sea - training in the necessary equipment, an increased level of interdepartmental cooperation, and to demonstrate to the general public the skills and determination of those services responsible for combating pollution in the Algarve’s seas.
The choice of the port in Olhão is becasue is it a large, busy commercial dock and the fact that it is located in the sensitive Ria Formosa natural park area where the barrier islands lie with their endless clean beaches and abundant wildlife.
The organisers claim to recognise the importance of tourism and recreation so want to prevent and combat oil pollution on the beaches and in the ports. How they propose to prevent oil pollution will be of special interest.
About 60 people will be involved in action and demonstrations of pollution containment barriers, reclaimers, absorbent material, portable tanks, light cleaning equipment, specailist tractors and personal protective equipment.
From the list of those organisations taking part, it appears that no oil companies will be present to offer reassurance that their own safety response systems to deal with oil spills can be in place and operable at a moment’s notice.
As it stands, if there is an oil accident off the Algarve’s coastline, as there was in the northernmost coast in 2002, it is likely that nobody will be held to account and it will be down to local efforts to clean up the mess - the taxpayer pays again.
The Prestige oul tanker (see full story below) spilled 63,000 tonnes of crude oil into the sea and eventually onto nearly 3,000 kms of shoreline in Portugal, Spain and France in 2002.
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The Prestige was a Greek-operated, single-hulled oil tanker, officially registered in the Bahamas, but with a Liberian-registered single-purpose corporation as the owner.
The ship had a deadweight tonnage, or carrying capacity, of approximately 81,000 tons, a measurement that put it at the small end of the Aframax class of tankers, smaller than most carriers of crude oil but larger than most carriers of refined products.
The French, Spanish and Portuguese governments refused to allow the Prestige to dock in their ports.
On November 13, 2002, while the Prestige was carrying 77,000 metric tons of cargo of two different grades of heavy fuel oil, one of its twelve tanks burst during a storm off Galicia, in northwestern Spain. Fearing that the ship would sink, the captain called for help from Spanish rescue workers, with the expectation that the vessel would be brought into harbour.
However, pressure from local authorities forced the captain to steer the embattled ship away from the coast and head northwest. Reportedly after pressure from the French government, the vessel was once again forced to change its course and head south into Portuguese waters in order to avoid endangering France's southern coast.
Fearing for its own shore, the Portuguese authorities promptly ordered its navy to intercept the ailing vessel and prevent it from approaching further.
With the French, Spanish and Portuguese governments refusing to allow the ship to dock in their ports, the integrity of the single-hulled oil tanker was quickly deteriorating and soon the storm took its toll when it was reported that a 40-foot (12 metre) section of the starboard hull had broken off, releasing a substantial amount of oil.
At around 8:00 a.m. on November 19, the ship split in half. It sank the same afternoon, releasing over 20 million US gallons (76,000 m3) of oil into the sea. The oil tanker was reported to be about 250 kilometres from the Spanish coast at that time. An earlier oil slick had already reached the coast.
The Greek captain of the Prestige, Apostolos Mangouras, was taken into custody, accused of not cooperating with salvage crews and of harming the environment.
After the sinking, the wreck continued leaking oil. It leaked approximately 125 tons of oil a day, polluting the seabed and contaminating the coastline, especially along the territory of Galicia. The affected area is not only a very important ecological region, supporting coral reefs and many species of sharks and birds, but it also supports the fishing industry.
The heavy coastal pollution forced the region's government to suspend offshore fishing for six months.
