A subsidiary of Odfjell finds itself in hot water with the US Department of Justice once again. Singapore-based Odfjell Asia II, which was convicted in 2014 of violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships, has admitted to violating the conditions of its probation. As a result, OAII’s term of probation, which was scheduled to conclude this month, was extended by one year, and the company has agreed to additional probation conditions.
On May 14, 2014, a judge in the US sentenced OAII to a three-year term of probation and a total criminal penalty of $1.2m for violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships.
On May 16, 2016, a crewmember reported to OAII that, while he was serving onboard OAII’s vessel Bow Santos, there may have been a MARPOL compliance issue involving the disposal of machinery-space bilge water in December 2015. OAII reported the possible MARPOL compliance issue to US authorities and conducted an internal investigation.
The US and OAII have agreed that there was a breakdown in OAII’s internal reporting system in that it took more than six months before any crewmember of the Bow Santos reported the alleged incident to OAII.
