The towing of the burning freighter, the Fremantle Highway, which was off the coast of the Netherlands with thousands of cars on board, began on Sunday July 30, a day later than planned due to windy conditions. According to authorities, the fire aboard the ship has decreased significantly in intensity. The movement of the vessel began in the early afternoon, nearly five days after the fire started, according to a statement from the Dutch National Institute for Water Management.
He said there was “significantly less smoke this afternoon” on the Panamanian-flagged freighter which, according to the K Line shipping company that chartered the ship, carries 3,783 new cars, including 498 electric vehicles.
The freighter must be moved to a new temporary location: 16 km north of the islands of Schiermonnikoog and Ameland, a few dozen km east of its last official position, 18 km north of Terschelling. These Dutch islands straddle the Wadden Sea, a UNESCO World Heritage Site with a diversity of more than 10,000 aquatic and terrestrial species, and the North Sea.
An oil intervention boat is nearby, according to the authorities who hope to eventually tow the cargo ship to a port in order to avoid an ecological disaster. The freighter is “towed slowly and in a controlled manner (about 3 knots, 5.5 km per hour) by 2 tugs,” Rijkswaterstaat said.
Saturday’s planned tow was postponed due to a southwesterly wind which was “sucking” smoke over the tug, posing a health risk to the crew. “The stability of the ship is constantly monitored,” insisted the Rijkswaterstaat, which said on Friday that the cargo ship was intact below the waterline. The duration of the tow depends on “weather conditions, smoke development, current and tide”. The operation had previously been estimated at around 14 hours.
The 18,500-ton cargo ship left the German port of Bremerhaven for Port Said in Egypt before heading back to Singapore, its final destination. The cause of the fire overnight Wednesday is unknown, but one of the electric cars on board could be the cause. One of the 23 evacuated crew members died, several were injured. Operations to extinguish the fire were suspended on Thursday to prevent the ship from being destabilized by the amount of water entering.
