Technical failure in ballast management system led to failure of sunk ship: Shipping regulator
The containers that fell off the ship when it sank off Kochi coast on Sunday and were floating in the Arabian Sea would be retrieved in 48 hours, Jagannathan said, adding that environmental damage was minimal.
'The oil spill is limited and the Coast Guard is cleaning it. The oil in the ship bunker will be removed by July 3,' he said.
'Our primary inference is that the vessel sank due to mechanical failure of the ballast management system. Safety and environmental requirements of the ships are governed by norms set by International Maritime Organisation (IMO) and this vessel complied with international norms.
We have no evidence of other reasons. Failure of the ballast system may be due to lack of operational understanding. When the vessel listed to 26 degrees, there was a complete blackout due to failure of internal power generation. This virtually incapacitated all operations of the ship,' said chief surveyor of Union government Ajith Sukumaran.
About the cargo, Jagannathan said there were 13 containers carrying hazardous cargo of which 12 had calcium carbide, while one had rubber chemical antioxidants.
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