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MARINE

RENA update from Maritime NZ

Bay of Plenty Regional Council

Monday 23 January 2012, 2:43PM

By Bay of Plenty Regional Council

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TAURANGA

Monday, 23 January 2012 10:30 a.m.

Salvage

  • Six containers were removed from Rena on Saturday. No containers were removed yesterday (Sunday) after attempts to bring Smit Borneo in close to Rena were thwarted by the sea conditions.
  • Sea conditions have eased this morning and Smit Borneo is close alongside. Container removal has begun with one container removed by 9am.
  • In total, 60 bags of milk powder have been manually removed from the bow section of Rena, meaning two containers formerly filled with bags of milk powder are now empty.
  • Weather out at Astrolabe Reef is fine today. South west winds of around 20 knots observed early this morning have now eased to around 6-7 knots. The sea state is around 0.4metres. The fine weather is forecast to continue tomorrow.



Container and debris recovery

  • Braemar Howells' clean up operations over the weekend saw 23 containers offloaded at the port on Saturday, and six on Sunday. This brings the total to 436 containers brought ashore to date, since the grounding of Rena.
  • Debris removal operations are continuing at Bowentown Heads and Shelley Bay today. A boat team is working on debris removal on the East Cape.
  • Braemar Howells planned operations for the week ahead include debris removal on Motiti Island, which must take place during the two hours on either side of low tide. These operations will also be underway at Matakana Island. Bagged waste removal will be undertaken at Tuapior Rd near Katikati.
  • Later in the week, when weather conditions allow, Braemar Howells teams will be working at Orokawa Bay - removing timber from a 40ft container and stacking it above the high tide mark for removal of both the timber and the container.


Oil spill response

  • Oil spill response clean-up operations are underway today at Mount Maunganui, Leisure Island, Matakana Island and Rabbit Island.
  • A shoreline clean-up assessment team is working at Kauri Point.
  • The oil spill response team remains ready to respond to any reports of oil sightings from the public.


Wildlife

  • Work is continuing on demobilising the oiled wildlife facility at Te Maunga. It is expected the facility will be completely removed this week.
  • Any oiled birds picked up by the wildlife team will be stabilised in Tauranga before being transferred to Massey University in Palmerston North for treatment and rehabilitation. They will all be released back into the Bay of Plenty once they are healthy and their habitats ready.
  • Currently, the Massey University facility is caring for 2 grey faced petrels and 25 little blue penguins.
  • The oiled wildlife response team picked up one lightly oiled juvenile little blue penguin from Whale Island over the weekend.