In case you missed the news the other day, you should know a great accident was about to happen. The captain of a cargo ship transporting more than 1,200 luxury vehicles decided to deliberately run it aground on the Bramble Bank in Solent estuary, near Southampton, South England on Sunday night. The operation was done in a struggle to prevent the huge vessel from capsizing after it began listing dangerously.
The Hoegh Osaka was transporting a cargo worth at least £35 million ($53 million USD) as the ship was filled with Jaguars, Land Rovers, BMW Minis, 105 JCB diggers and a single Rolls-Royce Wraith. Figure this, the Wraith alone is worth an estimated £260,000 ($395,000).
While the scene has become a tourist attraction with car parks along the coast filling up with sightseers, car makers along with local authorities are struggling to find a way to get the ship back on track and prevent it from getting future damage. Reports say a salvage operation could take “weeks or months” and, according to the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA), it won’t start too soon since strong winds could make conditions too rough to work.
As expected, most of the vehicles are insured. However, this doesn’t mean they will be saved from being scrapped since similar accidents have happened before and the manufacturers took them off the market anyway to avoid potential legal action in the event of future road accidents.
The 51,000-ton vessel will be anchored in order to prevent it slipping further down the sandbank during the high winds. Once the weather will improve, experts claim the rescue mission will most likely use a technique known as “parbuckling” to right it.
The salvage technique has been used two years ago with the Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia and implies righting of a sunken vessel using rotational leverage.
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