MANILA, Philippines — Another eight vessels from the United States Coast Guard and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have arrived in the Philippines to join the oil recovery of three troubled vessels that sank off the waters of Bataan last month, the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) said Tuesday.
In a message sent to reporters, PCG said that the USCG and NOAA personnel arrived in Lamao Port in Limay, Bataan Wednesday, August 6.
USCG and NOAA personnel are providing technical assistance to the Incident Management Team for the ongoing recovery operations following three maritime incidents involving the MTKR Terranova, MTKR Jason Bradley, and MV Mirola 1 in the nearby waters of the province.
The PCG has yet to provide new developments on the salvage operations in the maritime incidents but the oil recovery in the sunken MTKR Terranova was expected to start in two weeks as the initial capping bags needed to be replaced by authorities with more durable metal caps that could endure bad weather and siphoning operations.
The MV Mirola 1, which was the third vessel that reportedly got into trouble in Bataan, began the manual scooping of oil inside the vessel which will then be followed by MTKR Jason Bradley while waiting for the start of oil recovery of the sunken MTKR Terranova which was carrying 1.4 million liters of industrial fuel oil.
Unlike the MTKR Terranova and the MTKR Jason Bradley, the MV Mirola Uno merely ran aground in shallow waters, meaning it is not submerged like the other two ships, the PCG said.
The Coast Guard said that oil spill booms were still in place where the tanker MT Terra Nova sank in Limay and where the MV Mirola 1 ran aground in Mariveles.
They are continuously repositioning and maintaining the booms around Terra Nova and are monitoring and containing the oil spill around Mirola 1, it said.
Authorities also said they have observed very thin oil sheens at the Terra Nova site.
The MTKR Terranova has so far reached several areas in Bulacan and Cavite despite efforts to contain the spill.
Cavite also placed eight areas in the province in a state of calamity after oil spills reportedly reached the province’s coastline.
