A South Korean bulk carrier has been kicked out of New Zealand for having a dirty hull.
The DL Marigold, owned by South Korea’s Daelim, was delivering a cargo of palm kernel at the port of Tauranga during what was meant to be a nine-day stay in New Zealand when divers discovered the ship’s hull had large amounts of barnacles and tube worms on its hull. The ship was expelled because of its severe biofouling and is now headed to Fiji for hull cleaning before it plans to return to New Zealand to finish offloading its cargo.
, owned by South Korea’s Daelim, was delivering a cargo of palm kernel at the port of Tauranga during what was meant to be a nine-day stay in New Zealand when divers discovered the ship’s hull had large amounts of barnacles and tube worms on its hull. The ship was expelled because of its severe biofouling and is now headed to Fiji for hull cleaning before it plans to return to New Zealand to finish offloading its cargo.“The longer the vessel stayed in New Zealand, the greater chance there was for unwanted marine species to spawn or break away from the ship,” an official commented.
This is the first time New Zealand, a country famous for its tough attitude to preserving its pristine nature, has kicked out a ship for biofouling – plenty more vessels could follow suit however. New rules will require all international vessels to arrive in New Zealand with a clean hull from May 2018. Until then, officials can take action in cases of severe biofouling.
Umm. No doubt the voyage to Fiji and back will do nothing to reduce the population of copra beetle in the holds, and there may be scope for a nice discussion about the charter party, but this is really “quite a new thing”. There will be many in the industry who will be quite unaware that a foul hull could have such severe financial consequences.
We need to introduce a ‘Like’ button for comments like that, welcome back Andrew!