An environmental disaster was finally averted when the Sealand Express, the container ship stranded for weeks off the coast at Table Bay, docked in Cape Town harbour on Sunday.
The 257-metre ship will be taken into dry dock on Monday so that her hull can be inspected for damage. It is expected that she will be repaired at a South African shipyard.
The Sealand Express, which is carrying hazardous cargo and has several thousand tons of fuel on board, was pulled from a sandbank by tugboats on Saturday afternoon during the spring high tide.
Ships waiting to enter the harbour had been cleared from the area in case the Sealand Express "popped like a champagne cork" from the sand, said Evelyn Holtzhausen, spokesman for United States Ship Management (USSM), which owns the vessel. Instead she had come away "like a knife through butter", he added.
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'Popped like a champagne cork' "The South African authorities bent over backwards to make all this happen.
"USSM said they had never experienced such co-operation," said Holtzhausen.
The ship was freed from the sandbank she was originally stuck on on Friday night. She soon hit another sandbank, however, and the tow line between her and the tug John Ross snapped.
High tide was expected at 4pm on Saturday, but the ship was unexpectedly freed half an hour beforehand by two other tugs while they were waiting for the John Ross, which had been called away earlier.
The Sealand Express ran aground off Sunset Beach during a winter's storm almost a month ago.
Twelve containers of hazardous materials were airlifted It is not known exactly why this happened, and crucial conversations between the port authorities and the ship, which should have been recorded, have reportedly been lost.
It is not yet known how long the ship will be in Cape Town.
Rod Vulovic, USSM chief operating officer, said the ship would be returned to service "as soon as possible".
Peter Lukey, deputy director-general of environment quality in the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, was quoted in an earlier report as saying that the hazardous cargo included fairly innocuous substances like paint as well as "real nasties" like fungicides, antimony and chromium trioxide, which were lethal to human and marine life.
Twelve containers of hazardous materials were airlifted from the ship by helicopter while she was still stuck.
The remaining containers will all be lifted off today. Some contained items - including household goods - which would be loaded onto other vessels soon, as they will have to be shipped away urgently.
Thousands of tons of fuel were pumped from the ship last month in a move to avert massive oil pollution, which could have occurred if the ship had broken up, and to make her lighter to help refloat her.
It was "virtually impossible" to estimate the costs of the rescue and repairs to the ship at this stage, Holtzhausen said.
USSM is conducting an inquiry into the incident.
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This article was originally published on page 4 of Cape Times on September 15, 2003
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