Oil spill detected from Russian freighter in Archipelago Sea
Police propose that M/S Sinegorsk captain and chief engineer be taken into custody
An oil spill was detected off the coast at Airisto near Turku in Southwestern Finland on Thursday. Around three cubic metres of oily bilge water was believed to have been dumped into the sea.
The police regarded it as likely that the spill had been discharged by a Russian cargo ship, the M/S Sinegorsk, and arrested the captain and the chief engineer of the vessel. They were questioned on Friday, and the police proposed they be remanded in custody. The incident is being investigated as an environmental offence.
However, the environmental effects of the oil spill appear to be smaller than at first feared.
On Friday, the seven clean-up ships of the Department for Rescue Services continued their operations in the oil spillage area between Turku’s Ruissalo and the island of Vepsä, while Turku’s voluntary firefighters were combing on foot the shores of Ruissalo between the districts of Saarronniemi and Kuuvannokka.
Raimo Aarnio from Turku’s Department for Rescue Services reported in the afternoon that the fine sunny weather had stimulated the evaporation of light fuel oil. According to his evaluation, the clean-up operations could be brought to an end on Friday, provided that no new oil slick would be detected. Very small amounts of oil had reached the shores, and no birds had been smeared with oil.
At the same time, Aarnio noted that some heavy fuel oil mixed in with the bilge water could have sunk below the surface, from where it could flow with the currents farther off.
The samples taken from the Russian freighter Sinegorsk and from the sea at Airisto were sent to the laboratory of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) on Friday, while the suspected vessel was anchored in the strait between Nauvo and Korppoo.
The Sinegorsk is owned by the Vladivostok-based Far Eastern Shipping Company (Fesco), the largest shipping line in Eastern Russia.
Prior to this, the most recent major oil damage in the Turku area occurred at Fortum’s Naantali oil refinery in December of 2001, when over 300,000 litres of oil were discharged.