Correspondent: The Scandal of the Erika Tx Date: 12th August 2000 00.00.50 Tom Mangold This is the more glamorous side of the world of shipping at its spiritual centre here in Athens. 00.00.55 Tom Mangold These shipowners, brokers, wheelers and dealers are part of the colourful face of the global commerce. 00.01.02 Aston TOM MANGOLD They are generally speaking very very rich, fiercely independent, with a tradition of ruthless private enterprise verging on the bucaneering. 00.01.10 Tom Mangold But behind all this glad-handing lies the shadow of the sinking of the tanker Erika in one of Europe’s worst oil disasters. It was the catastrophe they said that couldn’t happen. 00.01.22 Tom Mangold So tonight we investigate the death of the Erika. We ask who is responsible, and why can’t this industry steer itself away from the rocks? 00.01.30 Music 00.02.02 Title Page The SCANDAL of the ERIKA 00.02.09 Tom Mangold On December 8th last year the 37,000-ton tanker Erika left Dunkirk and sailed up the channel towards the West of France and her ultimate destination – Italy. 00.02.22 Tom Mangold The Erika was an old vessel reaching the end of her shelf life – she was built a quarter of a century ago. And as befitted her age, she was a bargain basement charter working for half the price of a safe modern tanker. 00.02.35 Tom Mangold Her value at £4 million was a quarter of the price of a new tanker. 00.02.42 Tom Mangold Despite her age she had been chartered to carry 30,000 tonnes of oil by Total of France, a major oil company. The bill should have been £135,000 but is ending up costing Total £85 million – so far. 00.02.57 Tom Mangold After leaving Dunkirk and as she turned the corner of France into the notorious Bay of Biscay she ran headfirst into a bad storm. 00.03.05 Tom Mangold Tankers are built to endure these storms. Often they simply cannot run for cover; and the Erika should have taken the strain without much more than a groan and a murmur. 00.03.15 Tom Mangold But by the evening and throughout the night the storm increased in ferocity. Huge waves began to lash the tanker. 00.03.23 Tom Mangold She developed a serious list and slowly became more difficult to control. Within hours it was obvious that the vessel was in real distress. 00.03.32 Aston Capt KARUN MATHUR Master, the Erika I was just praying to God that we should make it to the port and even, not even believing that maybe we may not even make it. So it was a terrible feeling. 00.03.53 Tom Mangold As the pounding continued, Captain Mathur began to send out distress calls. But the storm had other plans for him. 00.04.02 Tom Mangold The vessel began to creak and groan ominously. 00.04.06 Tom Mangold And suddenly a tanker captain’s ultimate nightmare: Cracks appeared and crept along the ship’s deck. She was being tested by the sea and wasn’t up to it. 00.04.15 Tom Mangold Slowly, in a force nine gale, the Erika was beginning to run out of fight. 00.04.26 Tom Mangold Now back in India, Captain Mathur explained how his ship began to unpeel like a sardine tin. 00.04.32 Captain Mathur The ship was something like this. Hull plating just tore away and floated like this. 00.04.42 Tom Mangold And the water came in through the hole there? 00.04.44 Captain Mathur Water came in through here. 00.04.45 Tom Mangold And then what happened? 00.04.48 Captain Mathur The ship, can you say, jack-knifed like this, bow and the stern. 00.04.54 Tom Mangold And then? 00.04.55 Captain Mathur And then tore away like paper. 00.04.58 Tom Mangold Literally, just tore in half? 00.04.59 Captain Mathur Yes. 00.05.00 Storm footage 00.05.07 Tom Mangold A few hundred miles, but a whole world away from the disaster, the Erika’s owner was enjoying a holiday in the Italian Alps. His vessel (one of four tankers) was working for him; life was all right. 00.05.19 Mobile Phone rings 00.05.22 Aston GUISEPPE SAVARESE Owner, the Erika And we just had lunch. I received a call telling me that the Erika had some problems. He told me the ship had been listing, which the ship launched an SOS and that the master and the crew were trying to rectify the situation. 00.05.41 Tom Mangold As the Erika began her long death throes, Captain Mathur sent a distress signal. 00.05.46 Subtitles The hull plating abreast No.2 starboard SBT washed away. Present position 47 12N 004 35W. 00.05.55 Tom Mangold By now French rescue helicopters with infrared cameras fluttered uneasily above the stricken vessel. It was clear to them the crew was in peril. 00.06.04 Helicopter in flight 00.06.12 Tom Mangold So you are on the bridge with your crew. The bow of the ship has separated from the rest of the vessel. You are in command of half a ship. What happened then? 00.06.26 Captain Mathur I told the crew that the ship is breaking up, you know, and we have to get out as soon as possible. 00.06.39 Tom Mangold The early infrared images showed that some oil was already beginning to spurt from the sinking vessel. Most remained for a while inside sealed tanks. 00.06.48 Tom Mangold By now the Royal Navy Air Rescue helicopter from Cornwall was scrambled in support. 00.06.54 Lt Fraser Hunt It was just like a scene out of a film when we arrived with the bow part of the superstructure sticking out vertically from the sea and then about a quarter of a mile away the superstructure part of the ship also sticking out. 00.07.05 Aston Lt FRASER HUNT 771 Naval Air Squadron And then these poor thirteen chaps in the lifeboat getting thrown about and wet and all sorts of horrible things happening to them in the lifeboat. 00.07.14 Lt Fraser Hunt Oil slick, ropes everywhere. It was a pretty horrendous scene. 00.07.18 Tom Mangold The crew was eventually saved. 00.07.21 Tom Mangold News of Erika’s death was flashed to her charterers Total Oil. If hiring an old tanker has its risks, Total must have realised their gamble had just failed. 00.07.30 Aston BERTRAND THOUILIN Total Oil Well it was a big shock. It was a big shock. I didn’t realise immediately what was going on, of course, because we didn’t see the pictures immediately. 00.07.39 Bertrand Thouilin I just heard the news on the phone that the vessel was in two parts and I knew that we were going on for very long and very difficult times. 00.07.48 Music 00.08.38 Tom Mangold Slowly at first, some above and some below the water, a great black blanket of oil drew its tidal cover towards the coast of Brittany, a poisonous veil moving remorselessly towards one of Europe’s most fertile fishing, shellfish, marine wildlife, and tourist environments. 00.08.58 Bertrand Thouilin The spills was very, very long. It’s more than 400 kilometres coast, and it has been really horrible. Horrible. And of course we share the emotion of the public. 00.09.11 Tom Mangold Then every oil company’s ultimate nightmare. The dead birds. 00.09.17 Bertrand Thouilin Yeah, yeah. As soon as one bird came ashore with oil slicks, the media pressure was simply terrifying. 00.09.31 Tom Mangold They die very slowly; their elegant plumage caked in toxic filth. Death is the long slow choking nightmare, followed by drowning as the bird’s natural waterproofing is eaten away. At the end it’s a lifeless oily rag. 00.09.50 Tom Mangold But it got even worse. The oil came in by the ton, heaping layer after layer of slimy detritus onto the rocks, the sand over hundreds of miles of wild coastline. 00.10.00 Tom Mangold Each new tide brought oil that slowly hardened with the exposure into the consistency and texture of old chewing gum. This stuff just doesn’t clean easily. 00.10.10 Guiseppe Savarese I feel extremely extremely sorry to see the images of what happened to Brittany and the pollution there. I feel extremely sorry and disappointed of what has happened. 00.10.25 Tom Mangold Did you ever feel you wanted to take your jacket off and help clean the oil from the rocks? 00.10.30 Guiseppe Savarese Yes, I mean my wife to be honest, I mean she wanted to go and try. 00.10.38 Tom Mangold Did she? Really? And you said, no. 00.10.41 Guiseppe Savarese I said that she would, it would have been dangerous for her in that situation to go there and clean. I mean, I think I would be very worried to having her there. 00.10.52 Tom Mangold Because she might have been lynched? 00.10.54 Guiseppe Savarese Yes. 00.11.02 Tom Mangold As the massive cleaning operation began in Brittany, and with anger spreading throughout Europe, the great international inquest began. 00.11.12 Tom Mangold Another catastrophic oil spill. What on earth had gone wrong and who was to blame? 00.11.22 Tom Mangold So how could it happen? An apparently sound and seaworthy tanker breaks up in a storm and spills its cargo of oil all over the beautiful beaches of Brittany. 00.11.32 Tom Mangold Yet before every voyage a tanker is supposed to clear one, two, three, four major independent safety hurdles. 00.11.44 Tom Mangold And each one placed by four separate authorities. First there’s the in-depth mandatory annual check on every tanker conducted by organisations known as Classification Societies. It’s a sort of million pound MOT. They issue Class certificates, just like MOT certificates. Without it the tanker cannot sail. 00.12.05 Tom Mangold Secondly a ship must fly the flag and follow the shipping laws of her country. Owners can select any flag state they like, but the flag state is then obliged to regularly inspect their vessel. 00.12.19 Tom Mangold Thirdly, oil companies must also inspect tankers before they charter them. 00.12.28 Tom Mangold And finally, ports have the right to inspect the condition of visiting tankers, and, if necessary, detain them. That’s called Port State Control. Four safety checks - not one of them sufficient. 00.12.43 Tom Mangold The Erika was one of eight Japanese sisters, sibling of a troubled family. One has now sunk, and three others have suffered substantial structural failures over the years. 00.12.55 Tom Mangold She was built by a shipyard, which subsequently closed down. The Erika was at the cheaper end of the market, quite safe but rather light on steel, carrying, it has been claimed, some ten per cent less than many other tankers of similar size. 00.13.09 Tom Mangold As oil charter fees began to soar with the tightening of tanker safety standards and world routes become busier, Erika and her sisters were to become cheaper alternatives for the long inter-ocean runs. 00.13.21 Tom Mangold They joined the working ships at the less expensive end of the oil tanker market, acquiring a reputation, rather like ladies of easy virtue, for being available at a reasonable price. 00.13.31 Tom Mangold Ten years ago, one of the sisters The Green King was approaching the Magellan Straits when her managing agent took a call from the tip of South America. 00.13.40 Aston JACK BAYRAM Ship Manager The Master reported that the deck was buckling. It’s obviously quite concerning when you see a deck going up and down like that when it should be level and you realise all is not well. 00.13.57 Tom Mangold So the tanker put into Chile for emergency repairs. Eighteen months later- different sister, different ocean, same problem. Jack Bayram got another call. 00.14.08 Jack Bayram The master advised us that he’d got a fracture across the deck and the only thing we could do was divert him to the nearest port of refuge which was Falmouth. 00.14.22 Jack Bayram When we went down and inspected it and yes, the whole movement, the flexing of the ship, it had shed all the scaling and everything else, and you could see there was very heavy corrosion. 00.14.46 Jack Bayram When I saw that the Erika had gone I thought, well, she’s the same breed as the ships we have and she broke in a similar position, in the same area as the problems that we had, and it didn’t really come as any great surprise that it had happened. 00.15.05 Tom Mangold Structural failures, major weaknesses. The whole dismal history of some of the Erika’s sister ships was never centrally recorded or available to the Erika’s purchasers. 00.15.15 Tom Mangold It took this confidential industry investigation to uncover the truth but only after the Erika had gone down. 00.15.22 Tom Mangold To this day there is still no mandatory system for recording and making publicly available the true record of ships of shame. 00.15.31 Tom Mangold Another quaint old custom in the cosy world of ageing tankers is to allow the true ownership of the vessel to remain cleverly obscure. 00.15.39 Tom Mangold After the Erika sank and when official investigators tried to unravel her true ownership, they soon got lost in the commercial fog which they regarded as unacceptable and against the public interest. 00.15.51 Tom Mangold The Erika appeared to be run out of Italy, but owned by a Maltese company, which in turn was owned by two Liberian companies whose shares were deposited at a bank in Scotland. 00.16.02 Tom Mangold On its fateful voyage the tanker was chartered to a Bahamian company linked to a Swiss company which was linked to one in Panama, with the financial arrangements being channelled through a bank on Logarno. 00.16.14 Waves breaking 00.16.21 Tom Mangold Genoa, Italy; one of Europe’s most ancient trading ports and home today for some of the nation’s larger shipping concerns, as well as scores of smaller individual shipping companies. 00.16.35 Tom Mangold Guiseppe Savarese, the young Neapolitan ship owner who now faces criminal charges in France and has a £1 million bail on his head. It was he who set up Tevere Shipping which seems to own the Erika. 00.16.48 Tom Mangold You assigned the ownership of the Erika to Tevere Shipping? 00.16.53 Guiseppe Savarese Tevere Shipping is the company who owned the Erika. 00.16.56 Tom Mangold Right. That’s a brass plate company in Malta. 00.16.59 Guiseppe Savarese That is a company in Malta. Correct. 00.17.01 Tom Mangold A brass plate company. 00.17.02 Guiseppe Savarese Yeah, sure. 00.17.03 Tom Mangold So who owns Tevere Shipping? 00.17.05 Guiseppe Savarese Tevere Shipping is owned by two Liberian companies. 00.17.09 Tom Mangold Two Liberian? Why do they own it if it’s your vessel? 00.17.12 Guiseppe Savarese Because this is standard practice in shipping. 00.17.15 Tom Mangold But when the French allege there’s a certain lack of transparency in the ownership of the Erika, would you agree? 00.17.22 Guiseppe Savarese I would disagree because, I mean, I may agree with you that the structure may look very complex but it’s quite linear. 00.17.32 Bells ringing 00.17.34 Tom Mangold The truth is that, while Savarese is facing his responsibilities and has nothing to hide, many tankers do have deeply obscure ownerships hidden behind brass plate companies in order to limit liability to the one vessel in the event of a tanker disaster. 00.17.49 Tom Mangold This dodge is still allowed in Europe although in the United States the law now forces unlimited liability on tanker owners. 00.18.01 Tom Mangold By the time Savarese bought her, the Erika had sailed under a whole United Nations of flags including Norway, Hong Kong, Cyprus, Greece, Malta, Liberia and finally Malta again. 00.18.15 Tom Mangold Choosing the right flag is very important to an owner. He can avoid paying substantial taxes and dodge maintaining strict first world labour and safety laws. Crucially, he doesn’t have to pay his sailors first world pay rates either. 00.18.30 Tom Mangold That’s why these flags are called flags of convenience. Malta carries a certain reputation of unfussiness when it comes to registering shipping. 00.18.42 Tom Mangold The Malta Maritime Authority makes a nice income every year from every ship it registers. In return, Malta has to inspect but not survey the vessel regularly- a far less rigorous procedure. 00.18.54 Tom Mangold An EU Commission report sharply attacks the Maltese Authority for a lack of commitment to ship safety. 00.19.01 Tom Mangold Mr Vassallo, let me put it to you that this was the profile, the classic profile of a Mediterranean rust bucket dodging the law. 00.19.12 Lino Vassallo I don’t agree with that. 00.19.14 Tom Mangold Why did you give her the flag? 00.19.16 Aston LINO VASSALLO Malta Maritime Authority No, I don’t see…No, I don’t see first of all the need of a reference to Mediterranean rust bucket. This was a vessel which could have operated under any flag irrespective, so calling it a Mediterranean rust bucket is completely missing the issue. 00.19.32 Lino Vassallo This was a vessel which is very similar to many other vessels. 00.19.36 Tom Mangold Nothing in her history suggested anything dodgy there at all? 00.19.39 Lino Vassallo Not at all. 00.19.41 Tom Mangold And when you gave the flag to the Erika, were you aware of the history of her seven sister ships? 00.19.47 Lino Vassallo Some of those sister ships were even registered with us, and… 00.19.51 Tom Mangold And that didn’t worry you? 00.19.52 Lino Vassallo There were no particular problems as to the vessel per se. 00.19.56 Tom Mangold Were you aware that three of those sister ships had suffered substantial structural failure in the past? 00.20.02 Lino Vassallo We weren’t always aware of that. One, one particular failure was only brought, on a vessel which was not registered on Malta, was only brought to our attention recently. 00.20.13 Hammer blows 00.20.17 Tom Mangold Whatever their share of guilt, the Maltese Maritime Authority will deflect any blame onto RINA, the Italian Classification Society that performed the detailed survey on the vessel before her last voyage. 00.20.29 Tom Mangold This is an industry where the poisoned chalice is passed on with maximum speed. 00.20.34 Tom Mangold Ultimate responsibility for the Erika’s safety lay with RINA who had to do the official MOT, if you like, and issue a certificate of seaworthiness. 00.20.48 Tom Mangold However, we have established that Roberto Cazzulo, head of RINA’s New Construction Department wasn’t even aware of the Erika’s unhappy family background when the company agreed to take her onto her books. 00.21.05 Aston ROBERTO CAZZULO RINA Classification Society Yes, really this is a matter of concern that we should have, after the Erika; we must have known that. 00.21.12 Roberto Cazzulo Even if, perhaps, the history of the sister vessels is not directly related to the cause of the casualty, it would be extremely important for ourselves, for our surveyors to know that some parts of the vessel had these problems and to go further in going and looking at the details of this. 00.21.33 Tom Mangold Would you buy a car without knowing anything about its history? 00.21.37 Roberto Cazzulo Well, with shipping, perhaps… 00.21.40 Tom Mangold Would you? 00.21.41 Roberto Cazzulo No. 00.21.42 Tom Mangold Would you have taken on the Erika if you had known about her background, her history and the history of her sister ships? 00.21.50 Roberto Cazzulo Well, I cannot ensure that the answer could be yes or no. Certainly our surveyor would have looked much more into the details of some parts of the vessel. 00.22.00 Tom Mangold But RINA may have made a far more significant mistake. In August 1998, the Erika went into the shipyard for a major survey. 00.22.09 Tom Mangold These pictures show fairly severe deck corrosion, but it was much worse in the ballast tanks below decks. RINA’s inspection led to extensive repairs - a big $1 million bill for the owner. 00.22.21 Sparks flying 00.22.25 Tom Mangold The repairs were carried out, but it seems that only 80 tonnes of steel was used for work they believe needed at least 120 tonnes. 00.22.35 Tom Mangold There’s also concern that workers in the shipyard may have failed to properly replace and weld steel plates patched on the hull of the doomed vessel. 00.22.44 Tom Mangold The question now arises: Were short cuts taken? 00.22.50 Aston LINO VASSALLO Malta Maritime Authority It is a fact that a vessel which is nearing the end of its lifetime sometimes might not be fully maintained as it should. I’m not saying that this is the normal case. I’m not saying that this is what all the owners do, but, yes, there have been cases where because the ship is nearing the end of its lifetime, its economical lifetime, there is a reluctance to spend more than one needs to as a minimum to keep it maintained in a proper way. 00.23.21 Tom Mangold It’s clear that something went catastrophically wrong in that shipyard. 00.23.25 Aston GUISEPPE SAVARESE Owner, the Erika Unfortunately. I mean, the shipyard… 00.23.26 Tom Mangold Do you accept that? 00.23.28 Guiseppe Savarese In the shipyard? 00.23.28 Tom Mangold Yeah. 00.23.29 Guiseppe Savarese No, I don’t accept that. 00.23.31 Tom Mangold You don’t accept that the repairs were inadequate? 00.23.34 Guiseppe Savarese I don’t think so, that the repairs were inadequate. I mean… 00.23.37 Tom Mangold Well if the repairs were adequate, what sank the Erika? 00.23.41 Guiseppe Savarese I don’t know. 00.23.42 Tom Mangold But you must have a clue. 00.23.43 Guiseppe Savarese I don’t have a clue. I mean, I can have a theory. 00.23.44 Tom Mangold You are a young, wise, experienced ship owner. Your vessel has gone down, to world publicity and world condemnation. Are you seriously sitting there and telling me, well I haven’t really thought about why she went down. 00.23.59 Guiseppe Savarese I did. I thought about a lot. 00.24.00 Tom Mangold What’s your conclusion? 00.24.02 Guiseppe Savarese A lot of people did behave in an extremely bad way. RINA has behaved in an extremely bad way because I paid RINA to certify my ship. I did pay RINA, which is an institution - at that time it was a state-owned institution - that had to verify that my ship was in proper condition. They did verify that my ship was in proper condition. They did verify that the ship was in proper condition twenty days prior. 00.24.31 Guiseppe Savarese If, as some people are alleging, there was a structural problem, they should have been able to spot that there was a structural problem. If they give me a clean bill of health on my ship, I am allowed to trade that ship. 00.24.47 Tom Mangold While the owner bears the ultimate legal and moral responsibility, the Erika scandal still focuses around RINA, the Italian classification society who cleared the Erika just sixteen months before she fell apart. The poison chalice moves on. 00.25.02 Aston ROBERTO CAZZULO RINA Classification Society We believe the surveyor made his job in trying to detect any potential problem. However we cannot exclude that part of the repairs, or some interventions by the shipyard, could have been the cause of some latent defects in the hull. 00.25.20 Tom Mangold Why wasn’t that spotted by your surveyor? 00.25.22 Roberto Cazzulo The surveyor made his job with the best of his professional duties. 00.25.28 Tom Mangold It seems to me that you’re not closing your mind to the possibility that your surveyor failed to spot poor workmanship. 00.25.34 Roberto Cazzulo Yes, we are not excluding this in our… 00.25.36 Tom Mangold You’re not excluding it? 00.25.37 Roberto Cazzulo No. 00.25.38 Tom Mangold It is possible, in which case it would be the fault of RINA that this vessel sank? 00.25.43 Roberto Cazzulo Well, there is a part of a responsibility for RINA to make a good job during a survey. We have done all the best in order to spot these defects. We have not found defects, but we cannot exclude that a latent defect could be in that area. 00.26.01 Tom Mangold Once repaired, the Erika returned to work in the Mediterranean and Black Seas on charter for several oil companies. 00.26.08 Tom Mangold Even if RINA had failed to check the work had been efficiently completed, what about the extra independent safety check by which the charterers themselves, in this case Total Oil, were obliged to inspect the Erika and declare her safe and seaworthy? 00.26.23 Tom Mangold M. Thouilin, did you inspect the Erika for her worthiness to carry your oil? 00.26.29 Aston BERTRAND THOUILIN Total Oil Yes we did. We visited the ship in November 1998, less than one year before the sinking of the Erika and the vessel was later on inspected again by different other oil companies with whom we share the survey reports. 00.26.46 Tom Mangold So you were satisfied that the work had been done properly by the ship owner and the classification society? 00.26.50 Bertrand Thouilin Absolutely. 00.26.51 Tom Mangold Well why did she break up after sixteen months? 00.26.54 Bertrand Thouilin Because the documents which have been shown to us were not correct. 00.26.59 Tom Mangold So the documents were a fraud. 00.27.02 Bertrand Thouilin I don’t know. We got from the RINA a certificate stating that the hull of the vessel was correct and the structures of the vessel were good and in good conditions. Now it has to be seen whether this certificate was a fraud or not. 00.27.23 Tom Mangold There is no evidence of fraud, but RINA carries most responsibility. However the blame may eventually broaden. The scandal of the Erika has already led to calls for an overall tightening of the weak European safeguards against tragedies like this. 00.27.37 Tom Mangold Ten years ago, after a similar oil disaster off Alaska, the Americans forced through draconian new tanker safety laws. 00.27.44 Indian Dock workers 00.27.54 Tom Mangold Back in his homeport of Bombay, the hero in this tragedy, Captain Mathur, the man who single handedly kept his calm as his command sank beneath his feet, and organised the safe evacuation of his terrified crew. 00.28.07 Tom Mangold Ironically, he is the one man who was immediately held responsible and hurled into a French prison. 00.28.12 Tom Mangold And you were there for how long? For seven days? 00.28.25 Captain Mathur Seven days. 00.28.17 Tom Mangold That’s the first time you’ve been in prison? 00.28.19 Captain Mathur The first time I was in a police station, let alone a prison. 00.28.26 Tom Mangold You had lost your vessel, but you had got all your crew off safely. Nobody died. You get to land, and you’re put in prison. What did you think? 00.28.41 Aston Capt KARUN MATHUR Master, the Erika I was thinking what kind of system is this, you know? For no fault of mine I am being put into prison and what about the other players? 00.28.57 Captain Mathur I am not the one who owns the ship. I am not the one who manages the ship. I am here only for one and a half months. I am only operating the ship and I am the one who is put in the prison. What about the rest? 00.29.13 Tom Mangold After a week in a Paris prison the master was allowed out on bail, his reputation and morale in shreds. 00.29.20 Tom Mangold So Captain Mathur left France and came back home here to Bombay. He remains traumatised, unemployed, and still faces serious charges in the French courts. 00.29.30 Tom Mangold So is he an inexperienced amateur, a hero who saved his crew, or worse still, has he been made the fall guy for the whole Erika disaster? 00.29.41 Tom Mangold Captain Mathur will receive no medals for his courage. On the contrary, a peremptory report on the disaster by RINA points accusingly at his alleged lack of experience and his poor seamanship during the Erika crisis. 00.29.54 Tom Mangold RINA quickly passed the poison chalice to him, but has told us privately it now rejects that injudicious accusation. But it’s all a bit late for the young Indian master. Nor has he been the recipient of much help and comfort from his employer, ship owner Guiseppe Savarese. 00.30.13 Tom Mangold What kind of man is Mr Savarese? 00.30.16 Captain Mathur Well, he is a businessman who is out to make a profit, never mind how he makes it. 00.30.25 Tom Mangold Has he spoken to you since the disaster? 00.30.31 Captain Mathur He has never spoken to me. 00.30.33 Tom Mangold Let me get this straight. You were the master of his vessel. The vessel sank underneath you. You saved the entire crew. You were put in prison for your pains. And you haven’t heard a word from Mr Savarese? 00.30.49 Captain Mathur Yes, that is correct. 00.30.50 Tom Mangold Not one word? 00.30.51 Captain Mathur Not a word. 00.30.52 Tom Mangold A letter? 00.30.53 Captain Mathur No. 00.30.54 Tom Mangold A telex? 00.30.55 Captain Mathur No. 00.30.55 Tom Mangold A phone call? 00.30.56 Captain Mathur Nothing. 00.30.58 Tom Mangold Strange, isn’t it? Strange? 00.31.02 Captain Mathur I don’t know. Maybe this is the way they work. 00.31.07 Aston GUISEPPE SAVARESE Owner, the Erika I am sure that once this matter is solved, I will be very pleased to talk with the Master. Unfortunately at the moment I have been suggested by my lawyers and also his lawyers, that in the interests of both of us, we shouldn’t talk since we have never talked up to now. It would appear as an interference from my side or from his side. 00.31.32 Tom Mangold Not a very kind of human business, is it? 00.31.35 Guiseppe Savarese I agree, I agree. I have always defended and praised the professionalism of the master, and not only the Master, of the chief officer and of the tankermen. 00.31.56 Tom Mangold Meanwhile the dead Erika’s lethal cargo continues to bleed from the holes in her corpse. As the black tendrils of fuel snake through the water en route to land, Total are spending £85 million in plugging the gaps and pumping out the rest of the cargo. 00.32.12 Tom Mangold At least they paid up without waiting for the interminable legal arguments about guilt to be concluded. 00.32.18 Tom Mangold And now the official French investigators confirm the apparent cause of the break-up lies with those last ballast tank repairs two years ago. 00.32.31 Tom Mangold The French believe that the Erika had severe structural weaknesses here caused by corrosion. 00.32.38 Tom Mangold During the storm there was a bulkhead rupture between two tanks that began the chain of events which led eventually to the buckling of the hull plate, which was followed by the tanker snapping in two like a toy paper boat in a bath. 00.32.55 Tom Mangold Does RINA accept the blame for this disaster? 00.33.01 Aston ROBERTO CAZZULO RINA Classification Society Well, we were blamed just a few days after the disaster to be one of the responsible, responsible for the casualty, because the vessel had a structural failure. Undoubtedly the vessel broke up of the structural failure. 00.33.18 Roberto Cazzulo I think the blame culture in this respect is not very helpful in order to identify actions for the future. 00.33.25 Tom Mangold You shouldn’t say that to the people of Brittany. 00.33.30 Roberto Cazzulo Of course we have a lot of sympathy of what’s happened to the people in Brittany and the consequence of this disaster. 00.33.37 Tom Mangold Sir, if you don’t have a blame culture, how is this industry ever going to get itself off the rocks? How is this industry ever going to put things that go wrong right, and stop these terrible oil spills? 00.33.50 Roberto Cazzulo I think that what you said is very important. The lessons to be learned from the Erika casualty, or from a casualty like that, are to be really considered and discussed into details, including the role, responsibilities and liabilities of a classification society. Of RINA in this case. 00.34.11 Tom Mangold Even if the poison chalice finishes in RINA’s lap, there are larger questions to be asked of an industry that invariably maintains each new oil disaster can never happen again. 00.34.22 Tom Mangold But the Erika’s not a one off for RINA or the Maltese registry. 00.34.26 Tom Mangold This is the tanker Nunki; the same weight as the Erika, the same flag of convenience, the same classification society, and pretty much the same condition as the Erika; a disgrace. 00.34.39 Tom Mangold Just six months after the Erika scandal, the Nunki’s arrest in Amsterdam is a rare example of a port with its eyes open. As this rust bucket limped into harbour she was promptly detained. 00.34.51 Aston GOON SCHEERES Amsterdam Port Inspector Well, she’s in a very poor condition, very unsafe condition, because we are looking after safety of seafarers and protection of the environment. So that’s obviously something she can’t comply with. 00.35.03 Tom Mangold She’s the rust bucket of the month. 00.35.05 Goon Scheeres Well, I think she will be, but the survey hasn’t been finished, but well, there’s a big chance. 00.35.12 Tom Mangold It’s most unusual to gain access to a working rust bucket and these pictures show why publicity of any kind is anathema. 00.35.20 Tom Mangold The well-patched decks of the Nunki are very badly corroded, and in places the steel has lost up to a quarter of its thickness. This must have taken years to rust. 00.35.30 Tom Mangold Ventilation pipes that vent out fumes from the oil tanks and ship engines have in places rotted through and been patched up with canvas and sticky tape. 00.35.39 Tom Mangold This means in a storm, seawater can flood into these holes like water going up a car exhaust and into the engine, contaminating the fuel and causing a breakdown. That’s exactly what happened to the tanker Braer off Scotland seven years ago. 00.35.55 Tom Mangold We were escorted round the metal patchwork by a Dutch shipping engineer who could hardly believe what he saw. 00.36.01 Tom Mangold So 80% of this metal has gone. You just kick it and look… 00.36.04 Dutch engineer That’s right. That’s right. 00.36.06 Tom Mangold What you’re saying is, the surgery was very good, but the patient died. 00.36.14 Tom Mangold A rust bucket doesn’t develop overnight. It takes years to produce some of the conditions on this vessel and one doesn’t need to be an expert to spot the decay on deck and on the superstructure. 00.36.29 Tom Mangold But some things below the deck were even more troubling. 00.36.36 Tom Mangold There is corrosion on the metal stiffeners inside this hold. Not only is the Nunki’s skin beginning to flake off, but her very skeleton is developing rust cancer. 00.36.46 Tom Mangold How much corrosion is there in parts of the deck on this vessel? Well I’ll show you. Look at this. This is a hole. I can put my pen right the way through. 00.36.54 Tom Mangold This hole on the deck goes right through to the cargo tank below. That’s how much the metal has corroded on parts of this deck. 00.37.02 Tom Mangold This looks like a rust bucket, she is a rust bucket, and on top of all that she is very dangerous. 00.37.08 Tom Mangold I’ve been on board the Nunki. I have never seen anything like it. How did RINA let her get into that condition before declassifying her? 00.37.16 Roberto Cazzulo This is a point that we are seriously considering for our internal organisation. We are reviewing all the files. We are interviewing the surveyors. 00.37.27 Tom Mangold We saw holes in metal, in ventilation pipes that have been camouflaged by canvas, sticky tape and paint. Had this deceived your surveyor? 00.37.39 Roberto Cazzulo Our surveyor that carried out the annual survey a few months before this last port state control made some recommendations, but these recommendations were not to withdraw or to suspend the class at this time. 00.37.55 Tom Mangold So once again a RINA surveyor inspected a tanker in worse shape than the Erika, but allowed her to sail on. 00.38.02 Tom Mangold However following our unannounced visit onboard RINA threw the Nunki off her register. But what about the Maltese Maritime Authority? 00.38.10 Tom Mangold Why do you continue to flag rust buckets like the Nunki? 00.38.14 Lino Vassallo We don’t continue to flag rust buckets. 00.38.16 Tom Mangold She is a rust bucket. 00.38.17 Aston LINO VASSALLO Malta Maritime Authority Sometimes a flag bucket…a rust bucket, what people call a rust bucket sometimes develops into a rust bucket, not necessarily at the time of registration. 00.38.27 Lino Vassallo And that is why, not only in our law but in our practice, we delete vessels and we chuck out vessels from under the flag. 00.38.37 Tom Mangold Why didn’t you chuck her out? 00.38.39 Lino Vassallo The Nunki? When before the vessel was sent, before the vessel was going to Rotterdam, we had stopped the vessel and we had already issued a letter to the owner telling him, unless the vessel is brought up to scratch immediately the vessel will be kicked out of the flag. 00.39.01 Tom Mangold Mr Vassallo, that’s fine. It takes years for corrosion to develop to the extent that it has affected the Nunki. 00.39.09 Tom Mangold There are holes in her deck. She is a disgrace. All that happened while she was sailing under your flag. Where were your inspectors? 00.39.19 Lino Vassallo That I admit. That something also has gone, must have gone wrong there. Some things not to have been spotted as early as they should have been, especially by the surveyors. 00.39.30 Lino Vassallo But when we say years for corrosion to…Corrosion doesn’t develop overnight, but on the other hand it doesn’t develop over years. Sometimes it can develop between one survey and another. 00.39.43 Tom Mangold Back on board a ship’s official is defensive. 00.39.47 Ship Official There is one hole. 00.39.48 Tom Mangold But Guiseppe, be honest. There’s an awful lot of rust on this ship. 00.39.53 Ship Official Another thing…Yes, about the rust. 00.39.56 Tom Mangold But even the Maltese Maritime Authority has now withdrawn its flag from the Nunki. She’ll never carry cargo again, and waits for the scrap dealers to pick over her scabrous body. 00.40.08 Tom Mangold Meanwhile in Brittany the true legacy of the Erika has yet to be determined. A fresh and breezy normality seems to have returned. 00.40.15 Tom Mangold But something new and sinister is happening beneath the waves. It’s not over yet. 00.40.21 Tom Mangold Most of the oil has now vanished, but that’s only the beginning of the problem. 00.40.26 Tom Mangold Studies done after the world’s worst oil disaster over ten years ago reveal that oil pollution is slowly beginning to enter the food chain. 00.40.34 Tom Mangold These two test tubes contain very young salmon. This one is as it should be, but this one has a gross malformation caused by oil pollution. 00.40.42 Tom Mangold It’s the first visible evidence that something very odd happens to nature long after an oil spill at sea. 00.40.52 Tom Mangold The extraordinary new research conducted by US scientists following the Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska, the worst in history, has revealed that even when the oil has vanished under the seabed and the water seems clear, oil continues to pollute. 00.41.07 Tom Mangold Incredibly the damage can be done by the equivalent of a thimbleful of oil in an Olympic sized pool. 00.41.14 Tom Mangold Researchers have established pollution entering the food chain even after ten years. And it’s not just deformed salmon fry; sea otters and ducks higher up the food chain have also been affected. 00.41.28 Tom Mangold As the clean up continues the coast of Brittany may eventually recover, but oil’s dark and ruinous signature has brought financial hardship. 00.41.36 Tom Mangold It’s now clear that the shipping industry running old tankers around European ports is taking too long to put its house in order; profits too high, complacency ubiquitous. 00.41.46 Tom Mangold Worse still, the safety measures to protect the innocent just don’t work. 00.41.53 French Oil Spill Cleaner Subtitles Whose fault is it? It’s someone’s responsibility- someone who’s profited from this. 00.42.00 French Oil Spill Cleaner If they come down here, they should be ashamed. 00.42.07 French Oil Spill Cleaner I don’t understand. What’s happened is so disgusting. It will be so hard to clean up and will last for such a long time. They should really be ashamed. 00.42.29 Tom Mangold The stains of the Erika will not wash off easily. 00.42.34 Tom Mangold France is angry, but France is also a powerful member of the European Union and the French will now fight to introduce the kind of tough legislation that the Americans imposed on tankers years ago. 00.42.46 Tom Mangold The shipping industry will drag its feet, use powerful lobbies to defend the status quo. It will delay and dissemble. 00.42.53 Tom Mangold But these images will haunt a generation, one that will be slow to forgive and will demand that after the scandal of the Erika nothing must remain the same. 00.43.11 End music and sound effects Credits www.bbc.co.uk/correspondent Reporter TOM MANGOLD