Prestige oil spill
Encyclopedia
The Prestige oil spill was an oil spill
off the coast of Galicia caused by the sinking of an oil tanker
in 2002. The spill polluted thousands of kilometers of coastline and more than one thousand beach
es on the Spanish
, French
and Portuguese
coast, as well as causing great harm to the local fishing industry
. The spill is the largest environmental disaster
of both Spain's history
and Portugal's history
.
-operated, single-hulled oil tanker, officially registered in the Bahamas, but with a Liberia
n-registered single-purpose corporation as the owner.
The ship had a deadweight tonnage, or carrying capacity, of approximately 81,000 tons, a measurement that put it at the small end of the Aframax
class of tankers, smaller than most carriers of crude oil but larger than most carriers of refined products. It was classed
by the American Bureau of Shipping and insured by the London Steam-Ship Owners' Mutual Insurance Association, a shipowners' mutual known as the London Club.
On November 13, 2002, while the Prestige was carrying a 77,000 metric tons cargo of two different grades of heavy fuel oil, one of its twelve tanks burst during a storm off Galicia, in northwestern Spain. Fearing that the ship would sink, the captain called for help from Spanish rescue workers, with the expectation that the vessel would be brought into harbour. However, pressure from local authorities forced the captain to steer the embattled ship away from the coast and head northwest. Reportedly after pressure from the French government, the vessel was once again forced to change its course and head southwards into Portuguese waters in order to avoid endangering France's southern coast. Fearing for its own shore, the Portuguese authorities promptly ordered its navy to intercept the ailing vessel and prevent it from approaching further.
With the French, Spanish and Portuguese governments refusing to allow the ship to dock in their ports, the integrity of the single hulled oil tanker was deteriorating quickly and soon the storm took its toll when it was reported that a 40 feet (12.2 m) section of the starboard hull had broken off, releasing a substantial amount of oil.
At around 8:00 AM on November 19, the ship split in half. It sank the same afternoon, releasing over 20 million USgals (75,708.2 m³) of oil into the sea. The oil tanker was reported to be about 250 kilometers from the Spanish coast at that time. An earlier oil slick had already reached the coast. The Greek captain of the Prestige, Apostolos Mangouras, was taken into custody, accused of not co-operating with salvage
crews and of harming the environment.
After the sinking, the wreck continued leaking oil. It leaked approximately 125 ton
s of oil a day, which polluted the sea bed and contaminated the coastline, especially along the territory of Galicia. The affected area is not only a very important ecological region, supporting coral reef
s and many species of shark
s and bird
s, but it also supports the fishing industry. The heavy coastal pollution forced the region's government to suspend offshore fishing for six months.
In the subsequent months, thousands of volunteers were organized with the help of neither the Galician nor the Spanish Government -both belonging to the conservative Partido Popular
- to help clean the affected coastline. The massive cleaning campaign was a success, recovering most portions of coastline not only from the effects of the oil spill but also from the accumulated usual contamination. A year after the spill Galicia had more Blue Flags
for its beaches (an award for those beaches with the highest standards in the European Union) than in the previous years.
Initially, the government thought just 17,000 tons of oil had been lost, and that the remaining 60,000 tons would freeze and not leak from the sunken tanker. In early 2003, it announced that half of the oil had been lost. Now that figure has risen to about 63,000 tons according to some sources. In 2004 the remaining 13,000 m³ of cargo oil was removed from the wreck, by means of aluminium shuttles and remotely operated vehicle
s (ROVs). In total, 20 million USgals (75,708.2 m³) of oil were spilled.
More than eighty percent of the tanker's 77,000 tons of fuel oil is now thought to have been spilled off Spain's north-west coast.
Experts predicted marine life could suffer pollution from the Prestige for at least ten years due to the type of oil spilt, which contain light fractions called polyaromatic hydrocarbon
s. These toxic chemicals could poison plankton, fish eggs and crustaceans, leading to carcinogen
ic effects in fish and other animals higher in the food chain.
The environmental damage caused by the Prestige was most severe in the coast of Galicia, where local activists founded the environmental movement Nunca Máis
(Galician for Never Again), to denounce the passiveness of the conservative government regarding
the disaster.
A recent report by the Galicia-based Barrie de la Maza economic institute criticised the Spanish government's handling of the catastrophe. It estimated the cost of the clean-up to the Galician coast alone at €2.5 billion. The clean-up of the Exxon Valdez
cost US$3 billion.
Since the disaster, oil tankers similar to the Prestige have been directed away from the French and Spanish coastlines. The then European Commissioner for Transport, Spaniard Loyola de Palacio
, pushed for the ban of single-hulled tankers.
The government was criticized for its decision to tow the ailing wreck out to sea — where it split in two — rather than into a port. World Wildlife Fund's senior policy officer for shipping, Simon Walmsley believed most of the blame lay with the classification society. "It was reported as being substandard at one of the ports it visited before Spain. The whole inspection regime needs to be revamped and double-hulled tankers used instead," he says. The US and most other countries are phasing out single-hulled tankers by 2012.
against the American Bureau of Shipping
(ABS), the Houston-based international classification society that had certified the Prestige as "in class" for its final voyage. The "in class" status states that the vessel is in compliance with all applicable rules and laws, not that it is or is not safe. On 2 January 2007, the docket in that lawsuit (SDNY 03-cv-03573) was dismissed. The presiding judge ruled that ABS is a "person" as defined by the International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage
(CLC) and, as such, is exempt from direct liability for pollution damage. Additionally, the Judge ruled that, since the United States is not a signatory to the International CLC, the US Courts lack the necessary jurisdiction to adjudicate the case. Spain's original damage claim against ABS was some $700 million.
International maritime trade publications including TradeWinds, Fairplay and Lloyd's List regularly presented the dispute as a possibly precedent-setting one that could prove fateful for international classification societies, whose assets are dwarfed by the scale of claims to which they could become subject.
Investigators have since learned that prior to the spill the Prestige had set sail from St. Petersburg
, Russia
, without being properly inspected. It traveled to the Atlantic via the shallow and vulnerable Baltic Sea
. A previous captain who complained about numerous structural deficiencies within the ship was rebuffed, and later resigned in protest.
The ownership of the Prestige is unclear, making it difficult to determine exactly who is responsible for the oil spill. Evidence is now pointing to a secretive Greek
family who allegedly registered the ship to a front company in Liberia
. Thus the Prestige sinking has exposed the difficulties in regulation posed by flags of convenience.
Others have argued that the Spanish government's refusal to allow the ship to take refuge in a sheltered port was a major contributing factor to the scale of the disaster.
Spanish investigators have concluded that the failure in the Prestige's hull was entirely predictable and indeed had been predicted already: the Prestige's two sister ships, Alexandros and Centaur, had been submitted to extensive inspections under the "Safe Hull" program in 1996. The organization which was in charge of the inspections, the American Bureau of Shipping
, found that both Alexandros and Centaur were in terminal decline. Due to metal fatigue in their hulls, modeling predicted that both ships would fail between frames 61 and 71 within five years. Alexandros, Centaur and a third sister ship, Apanemo were all scrapped between 1999 and 2002. For some reason, however, Prestige was not scrapped, and, little more than five years after the inspection, as predicted, Prestige's hull failed between frames 61 and 71.
of the remaining oil failed; and that bacteria corroding the hull could soon produce a rupture and quickly release much of the remaining oil and create another catastrophic spill. The report urged the government to take "prompt" action.
In March, eight years after the instruction of the Prestige case began in the Corcubion Court, UDNG, a small indepedentist Galician Party analyzed some of the main facts in the instruction as an evidence of strong corruption in Spanish judicial system.
Oil spill
An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially marine areas, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is mostly used to describe marine oil spills, where oil is released into the ocean or coastal waters...
off the coast of Galicia caused by the sinking of an oil tanker
Oil tanker
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a merchant ship designed for the bulk transport of oil. There are two basic types of oil tankers: the crude tanker and the product tanker. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries...
in 2002. The spill polluted thousands of kilometers of coastline and more than one thousand beach
Beach
A beach is a geological landform along the shoreline of an ocean, sea, lake or river. It usually consists of loose particles which are often composed of rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles or cobblestones...
es on the Spanish
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Portuguese
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
coast, as well as causing great harm to the local fishing industry
Fishing
Fishing is the activity of trying to catch wild fish. Fish are normally caught in the wild. Techniques for catching fish include hand gathering, spearing, netting, angling and trapping....
. The spill is the largest environmental disaster
Environmental disaster
An environmental disaster is a disaster to the natural environment due to human activity. It should not be confused with the separate concept of a natural disaster.-History:...
of both Spain's history
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and Portugal's history
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
.
The Event
The Prestige was a GreekGreece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
-operated, single-hulled oil tanker, officially registered in the Bahamas, but with a Liberia
Liberia
Liberia , officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Sierra Leone on the west, Guinea on the north and Côte d'Ivoire on the east. Liberia's coastline is composed of mostly mangrove forests while the more sparsely populated inland consists of forests that open...
n-registered single-purpose corporation as the owner.
The ship had a deadweight tonnage, or carrying capacity, of approximately 81,000 tons, a measurement that put it at the small end of the Aframax
Aframax
An ' ship is an oil tanker smaller than and with a breadth above 32.31 m. The term is based on the Average Freight Rate Assessment tanker rate system. class tankers are largely used in the basins of the Black Sea, the North Sea, the Caribbean Sea, the China Sea and the Mediterranean...
class of tankers, smaller than most carriers of crude oil but larger than most carriers of refined products. It was classed
Classification society
A classification society is a non-governmental organization that establishes and maintains technical standards for the construction and operation of ships and offshore structures...
by the American Bureau of Shipping and insured by the London Steam-Ship Owners' Mutual Insurance Association, a shipowners' mutual known as the London Club.
With the French, Spanish and Portuguese governments refusing to allow the ship to dock in their ports, the integrity of the single hulled oil tanker was deteriorating quickly and soon the storm took its toll when it was reported that a 40 feet (12.2 m) section of the starboard hull had broken off, releasing a substantial amount of oil.
At around 8:00 AM on November 19, the ship split in half. It sank the same afternoon, releasing over 20 million USgals (75,708.2 m³) of oil into the sea. The oil tanker was reported to be about 250 kilometers from the Spanish coast at that time. An earlier oil slick had already reached the coast. The Greek captain of the Prestige, Apostolos Mangouras, was taken into custody, accused of not co-operating with salvage
Marine salvage
Marine salvage is the process of rescuing a ship, its cargo, or other property from peril. Salvage encompasses rescue towing, refloating a sunken or grounded vessel, or patching or repairing a ship...
crews and of harming the environment.
After the sinking, the wreck continued leaking oil. It leaked approximately 125 ton
Ton
The ton is a unit of measure. It has a long history and has acquired a number of meanings and uses over the years. It is used principally as a unit of weight, and as a unit of volume. It can also be used as a measure of energy, for truck classification, or as a colloquial term.It is derived from...
s of oil a day, which polluted the sea bed and contaminated the coastline, especially along the territory of Galicia. The affected area is not only a very important ecological region, supporting coral reef
Coral reef
Coral reefs are underwater structures made from calcium carbonate secreted by corals. Coral reefs are colonies of tiny living animals found in marine waters that contain few nutrients. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, which in turn consist of polyps that cluster in groups. The polyps...
s and many species of shark
Shark
Sharks are a type of fish with a full cartilaginous skeleton and a highly streamlined body. The earliest known sharks date from more than 420 million years ago....
s and bird
Bird
Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...
s, but it also supports the fishing industry. The heavy coastal pollution forced the region's government to suspend offshore fishing for six months.
Cleanup
Partido Popular
Partido Popular may refer to:* People's Party * People's Party * The original name of the Popular Socialist Party...
- to help clean the affected coastline. The massive cleaning campaign was a success, recovering most portions of coastline not only from the effects of the oil spill but also from the accumulated usual contamination. A year after the spill Galicia had more Blue Flags
Blue Flag beach
The Blue Flag is a certification by the Foundation for Environmental Education that a beach or marina meets its stringent standards.The Blue Flag is a trademark owned by FEE which is a not-for-profit, non-governmental organisation consisting of 65 organisations in 60 member countries in Europe,...
for its beaches (an award for those beaches with the highest standards in the European Union) than in the previous years.
Initially, the government thought just 17,000 tons of oil had been lost, and that the remaining 60,000 tons would freeze and not leak from the sunken tanker. In early 2003, it announced that half of the oil had been lost. Now that figure has risen to about 63,000 tons according to some sources. In 2004 the remaining 13,000 m³ of cargo oil was removed from the wreck, by means of aluminium shuttles and remotely operated vehicle
Remotely operated vehicle
A remotely operated vehicle is a tethered underwater vehicle. They are common in deepwater industries such as offshore hydrocarbon extraction. An ROV may sometimes be called a remotely operated underwater vehicle to distinguish it from remote control vehicles operating on land or in the air. ROVs...
s (ROVs). In total, 20 million USgals (75,708.2 m³) of oil were spilled.
More than eighty percent of the tanker's 77,000 tons of fuel oil is now thought to have been spilled off Spain's north-west coast.
Experts predicted marine life could suffer pollution from the Prestige for at least ten years due to the type of oil spilt, which contain light fractions called polyaromatic hydrocarbon
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons , also known as poly-aromatic hydrocarbons or polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons, are potent atmospheric pollutants that consist of fused aromatic rings and do not contain heteroatoms or carry substituents. Naphthalene is the simplest example of a PAH...
s. These toxic chemicals could poison plankton, fish eggs and crustaceans, leading to carcinogen
Carcinogen
A carcinogen is any substance, radionuclide, or radiation that is an agent directly involved in causing cancer. This may be due to the ability to damage the genome or to the disruption of cellular metabolic processes...
ic effects in fish and other animals higher in the food chain.
The environmental damage caused by the Prestige was most severe in the coast of Galicia, where local activists founded the environmental movement Nunca Máis
Plataforma Nunca Máis
Nunca Máis is the name and slogan of a popular movement in Galicia formed in response to the Prestige ship environmental disaster in 2002. The movement's banner is based on the Galician flag, but with a blue diagonal on a black field, rather than a blue diagonal on a white field...
(Galician for Never Again), to denounce the passiveness of the conservative government regarding
the disaster.
Hull cleanup
In the two years following the sinking, engineers used ROVs to seal cracks in the tanker's hull, now 4000 meters below the sea surface, and slowed the leakage to a trickle of 20 litres a day. By 2004, engineers had removed the oil still in the tanker by drilling of small holes in the wreck, using remotely operated submersible vehicles (ROVs) like the one that originally explored the wreck of the RMS Titanic. The oil was then pumped into large aluminium shuttles, specially manufactured for this salvage operation. The filled shuttles were then floated to the surface. The original plan to fill large bags with the oil proved to be too problematic and slow. After the oil removal was completed, a slurry rich in microbiologic agents was pumped in the hold to speed up the breakdown of any remaining oil. The total estimated cost of the operation was over €100 million.A recent report by the Galicia-based Barrie de la Maza economic institute criticised the Spanish government's handling of the catastrophe. It estimated the cost of the clean-up to the Galician coast alone at €2.5 billion. The clean-up of the Exxon Valdez
Exxon Valdez
Oriental Nicety, formerly Exxon Valdez, Exxon Mediterranean, SeaRiver Mediterranean, S/R Mediterranean, Mediterranean, and Dong Fang Ocean is an oil tanker that gained notoriety after running aground in Prince William Sound spilling hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude oil in Alaska...
cost US$3 billion.
Since the disaster, oil tankers similar to the Prestige have been directed away from the French and Spanish coastlines. The then European Commissioner for Transport, Spaniard Loyola de Palacio
Loyola de Palacio
Loyola de Palacio y del Valle-Lersundi was a Spanish politician. She was one of the first women to rise to political prominence in Spain during the early years of democracy. She was a minister in the Spanish government from 1996 to 1998, and a member of the European Commission from 1999 to 2004...
, pushed for the ban of single-hulled tankers.
The government was criticized for its decision to tow the ailing wreck out to sea — where it split in two — rather than into a port. World Wildlife Fund's senior policy officer for shipping, Simon Walmsley believed most of the blame lay with the classification society. "It was reported as being substandard at one of the ports it visited before Spain. The whole inspection regime needs to be revamped and double-hulled tankers used instead," he says. The US and most other countries are phasing out single-hulled tankers by 2012.
Legal Consequences
For the world maritime industry, a key issue raised by the Prestige incident was whether classification societies can be held responsible for the consequences of incidents of this type. In May 2003, the Kingdom of Spain brought civil suit in the Southern District of New YorkUnited States District Court for the Southern District of New York
The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York is a federal district court. Appeals from the Southern District of New York are taken to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (in case...
against the American Bureau of Shipping
American Bureau of Shipping
The American Bureau of Shipping is a classification society, with a mission to promote the security of life, property and the natural environment, primarily through the development and verification of standards for the design, construction and operational maintenance of marine-related facilities...
(ABS), the Houston-based international classification society that had certified the Prestige as "in class" for its final voyage. The "in class" status states that the vessel is in compliance with all applicable rules and laws, not that it is or is not safe. On 2 January 2007, the docket in that lawsuit (SDNY 03-cv-03573) was dismissed. The presiding judge ruled that ABS is a "person" as defined by the International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage
International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage
The International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage, 1992, often referred to as CLC, is a maritime treaty. The convention was adopted "to ensure that adequate compensation is available to persons who suffer oil pollution damage resulting from maritime casualties involving...
(CLC) and, as such, is exempt from direct liability for pollution damage. Additionally, the Judge ruled that, since the United States is not a signatory to the International CLC, the US Courts lack the necessary jurisdiction to adjudicate the case. Spain's original damage claim against ABS was some $700 million.
International maritime trade publications including TradeWinds, Fairplay and Lloyd's List regularly presented the dispute as a possibly precedent-setting one that could prove fateful for international classification societies, whose assets are dwarfed by the scale of claims to which they could become subject.
Investigation
The massive environmental and financial costs of the spill has resulted in an ongoing inquiry into how a structurally deficient ship was able to travel out to sea, much less approach Spain.Investigators have since learned that prior to the spill the Prestige had set sail from St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, without being properly inspected. It traveled to the Atlantic via the shallow and vulnerable Baltic Sea
Baltic Sea
The Baltic Sea is a brackish mediterranean sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and...
. A previous captain who complained about numerous structural deficiencies within the ship was rebuffed, and later resigned in protest.
The ownership of the Prestige is unclear, making it difficult to determine exactly who is responsible for the oil spill. Evidence is now pointing to a secretive Greek
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
family who allegedly registered the ship to a front company in Liberia
Liberia
Liberia , officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Sierra Leone on the west, Guinea on the north and Côte d'Ivoire on the east. Liberia's coastline is composed of mostly mangrove forests while the more sparsely populated inland consists of forests that open...
. Thus the Prestige sinking has exposed the difficulties in regulation posed by flags of convenience.
Others have argued that the Spanish government's refusal to allow the ship to take refuge in a sheltered port was a major contributing factor to the scale of the disaster.
Spanish investigators have concluded that the failure in the Prestige's hull was entirely predictable and indeed had been predicted already: the Prestige's two sister ships, Alexandros and Centaur, had been submitted to extensive inspections under the "Safe Hull" program in 1996. The organization which was in charge of the inspections, the American Bureau of Shipping
American Bureau of Shipping
The American Bureau of Shipping is a classification society, with a mission to promote the security of life, property and the natural environment, primarily through the development and verification of standards for the design, construction and operational maintenance of marine-related facilities...
, found that both Alexandros and Centaur were in terminal decline. Due to metal fatigue in their hulls, modeling predicted that both ships would fail between frames 61 and 71 within five years. Alexandros, Centaur and a third sister ship, Apanemo were all scrapped between 1999 and 2002. For some reason, however, Prestige was not scrapped, and, little more than five years after the inspection, as predicted, Prestige's hull failed between frames 61 and 71.
Health problems among cleaning staff
Five years later after the cleaning activities, a study found that people participating in the cleaning activities, many of them volunteers, suffered several health problems, such as lung, cardiovascular, and chromosome diseases. This was found among a study of 800 involved Spanish Navy personnel.Recent developments
In March 2006, new oil slicks were detected near the wreck of the Prestige which investigators found to match the type of oil the Prestige carried. A study released in December 2006 led by José Luis De Pablos, a physicist at Madrid's Center for Energetic and Environmental Research, concluded that 16,000 to 23,000 tons of oil remained in the wreck, as opposed to 700 to 1300 tons claimed by the Spanish government; that bioremediationBioremediation
Bioremediation is the use of microorganism metabolism to remove pollutants. Technologies can be generally classified as in situ or ex situ. In situ bioremediation involves treating the contaminated material at the site, while ex situ involves the removal of the contaminated material to be treated...
of the remaining oil failed; and that bacteria corroding the hull could soon produce a rupture and quickly release much of the remaining oil and create another catastrophic spill. The report urged the government to take "prompt" action.
In March, eight years after the instruction of the Prestige case began in the Corcubion Court, UDNG, a small indepedentist Galician Party analyzed some of the main facts in the instruction as an evidence of strong corruption in Spanish judicial system.
See also
- Flag of convenienceFlag of convenienceThe term flag of convenience describes the business practice of registering a merchant ship in a sovereign state different from that of the ship's owners, and flying that state's civil ensign on the ship. Ships are registered under flags of convenience to reduce operating costs or avoid the...
- Health crisisHealth crisisA health crisis or public health crisis is a difficult situation or complex health system that affects humans in one or more geographic areas, from a particular locality to encompass the entire planet...
- Manfred GnädingerManfred GnadingerManfred Gnädinger a.k.a. Man or O Alemán was a German hermit and sculptor who lived in the village of Camelle, on the Costa da Morte, in Galicia . He lived a very simple and natural life, building sculptures on the beach where he lived and tending to his small garden...
- Manuel RivasManuel RivasManuel Rivas is a Galician writer, poet and journalist. He began his career in some Spanish newspapers like El Ideal Gallego, La Voz de Galicia, El Pais, and was the sub-editor of Diario 16 in Galicia...
External links
- Perte totale suite à avarie de coque du petrolier bahaméen Prestige survenue dans l'ouest de la Galice." - Bureau d'Enquêtes sur les Événements de MerBureau d'Enquêtes sur les Événements de MerBureau d'Enquêtes sur les Événements de Mer is the French agency that investigates accidents and incidents of ships....
- 13–19 November 2002 - Plataforma Nunca Máis, Prestige activists (in Galician)
- Coordination Technical Bureau of Scientific Intervention Program against Accidental Marine Spills, This bureau is responsible for management and coordination works of research projects.
- Spill Response Experience Coordination Action - SPREEX This project is responsible for management and coordination research needs in Europe.
- WWF crisis response page on Prestige
- Prestige Oil Spill - first hand story of a Canadian volunteer, with photos
- Maps and statistics of affected costal area