Philippine Coast Guard says oil leaking from sunken tanker

This Coast Guard photo shows the bow of the M/T Terra Nova as it sank off Bataan on Thursday. (PHOTO FROM PHILIPPINE COAST GUARD)

MANILA, Philippines – Some of the 1.4 million liters of industrial fuel oil inside a sunken Philippine tanker has started to leak into Manila Bay, the coast guard said Saturday, calling for a suspension of fishing in the waterway.

The MT Terra Nova sank in bad weather in the busy waterway early Thursday, killing one crew member and leaving the country potentially facing its worst oil spill disaster.

The oil slick has more than tripled in size from Thursday and is now estimated to stretch between 12-14 kilometers (7.5-8.7 miles) across the bay, which thousands of fishermen and tourism operators rely on for their livelihoods.

Divers inspected the hull of the vessel on Saturday and saw a “minimal leak” from the valves, coast guard spokesman Rear Admiral Armando Balilo said, adding it was “not alarming yet”.

“It’s just a small volume flowing out,” Balilo said.

“We’re hoping that tomorrow we will be able to start syphoning the oil from the motor tanker.”

The coast guard has warned that if the entire cargo leaked it would be an “environmental catastrophe”.

It has previously said the oil leaking from the tanker appeared to be the diesel fuel used to power the vessel, which is resting on the sea floor under 34 meters (116 feet) of water.

Oil containment booms have been deployed for what Balilo earlier described as “the worst case scenario” of the cargo leaking out.

The vessel sank nearly seven kilometers from its origin in the port of Limay west of Manila. It was attempting to return to port after running into bad weather.

The incident occurred as heavy rains fuelled by Typhoon Gaemi and the seasonal monsoon lashed Manila and surrounding regions in recent days.

The state weather service said the monsoon had weakened by late Friday, giving the authorities a window of relative calm at sea to recover the cargo.

The coast guard estimates the extraction would take at least seven days.

The Philippines has struggled to contain serious oil spills in the past.

It took months to clean up after a tanker carrying 800,000 liters of industrial fuel oil sank off the central island of Mindoro last year, contaminating waters and beaches of the island and devastating the fishing and tourism industries.

Another tanker sank off the central island of Guimaras in 2006, spilling tens of thousands of gallons of oil that destroyed a marine reserve, ruined local fishing grounds and covered stretches of coastline in black sludge.