Over the last five policy years, 2014
to 2019, 18% of all pollution incidents handled by the Gard claims teams have
been caused by bunker spills, with an average cost per incident in excess of
USD 100,000. Although bunkering is a routine operation, it involves high risk.
The two main concerns in bunker spills are firstly, the environmental impact of
spills, especially from persistent oils, and secondly, the risk of crew members
and/or owners facing criminal prosecution. So why do spills happen and how can
they be prevented?
There can be a variety of reasons for
the spills but the majority is overflow incidents. The underlying causes could
be a high flow rate, incorrect line up, improper monitoring of both the tanks being
bunkered and those not being bunkered, or not acting on high level alarms. The
human element is very much involved. We see that bunker procedures and
checklists usually contain all the necessary points to prevent such incidents
from happening but what is lacking is putting them into practice. In our
experience continuous monitoring of bunker tanks irrespective of whether they
are being filled or not can help prevent a spillage, even in cases of incorrect
line up. It is important that crew members, who have been assigned to manage a
bunkering operation, are not burdened with other tasks and are well rested so
that they can focus on following what is required by their procedures.
A selection of articles previously
published by Gard AS may be read at,
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