Disaster of the ghost ship

WHILE SOME fraction of the population was in peak Carnival ecstasy, an unprecedented catastrophe was unfolding on the sister isle. Images of Carnival in Rio were making international headlines as video of an oil-coated coastline in Tobago made international headlines.

A massive oil tanker/cruise ship/frigate/of unknown origin somehow stealthily drifted within spitting distance of Tobago's south-western coast, laying down an oily blanket. The slick appeared to move with greater urgency than the containment response.

The spill associated with the belly-up vessel was reported last Wednesday. Booms to contain further spread were said to have been deployed days later. There's certainly more about this disaster that we don't know than we do. Much like the overturned ghost ship, we can't see the full picture beneath the surface.

Still, questions linger about why the response wasn't more aggressive. There's a video on YouTube of oil having ravaged the Petit Trou lagoon which is one of the many invaluable tourism and ecological sites on the island. According to reports, booms meant to corral the spill were only placed in the lagoon seven days after the slick was first noticed.

This country has an official national oil spill contingency plan. The reaction in the first few hours determines the success of any containment efforts. There were no outward signs of a strategic approach to addressing this crisis – the kind one would expect of a nation with more than 100 years of oil exploration and some experience spilling it.

Much of the information in the public domain was rendered murky by mixed messaging cut adrift in a sea of semantics. Director of the Tobago Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) Allan Stewart was quoted on the 11th as saying the spill was "contained."

However, divers dispatched to investigate the vessel (for trapped crew members) were unable to "plug" the leak because of the prevailing conditions. Visibility was poor and the vessel was moving far too much to be reasoned with. How can an oil spill be contained if the vessel is still pouring more oil into the water? I say oil, but is it oil?

Cue the incredulity of the foreign press: "The government doesn't know who owns the vessel, where it came from or what's even in it" – Max Foster, CNN. Not a good look.

Additionally, the Express newspaper reported on the 13th a "slick" 88 kilometres long and 18 kilometres away from the overturned vessel. That development didn't support the idea of containment. This particular article was careful not to identify the substance as oil. The reason (and this is conjecture) could be that the media are leery of conclusively identifying the creeping pollutant as crude oil.

Normally, in such ocean calamities, there's a kaleidoscopic slick on the surface which can be marine fuel oil – the fuel that propels the vessel. The volume of oil coating sensitive coastal areas and putting black socks on mangrove roots in Tobago seems to be far too much to be mere fuel oil.

If you're looking to the authorities for clarity there's only further opacity on offer. In an extraordinarily turgid 419-word news release, seemingly designed to maximise public confusion, the Institute of Marine Affairs did not definitively identify the "oil-like substance." The release alluded to testing samples.

Some of the characterisations of the emergency also clashed with sickening visuals of the broad impact of the spill. THA Chief Secretary Farley Augustine reportedly said, "There has been minimal impact on surrounding wildlife." This I found to be a breathtaking declaration amid an ongoing disaster.

There's considerable evidence that the "not molasses" has appeared in several environmentally sensitive areas – including coral reefs, mangroves and a turtle nesting site. Video circulating online shows the extent to which the spillage penetrated mangroves – nurseries for all sorts of marine species.

For civilians not steeped in maritime knowledge, it can seem odd that a vessel purportedly more than 300 feet long can materialise in our maritime borders without detection. This isn't some reef boat. It's either a case of advanced cloaking technology to evade discovery or primitive means of tracking such marine craft.

Another nauseating question filling the void is this: how long had this phantom ship been in our waters bleeding its toxic cargo? At the moment it's impossible to say when the ship ran into trouble and was abandoned.

With two major oil-producing nations near our borders, it shouldn't rest easy with anyone that we know so little about a peril that matters so much.