Grounded Ship Draws Curious
 Sandra Dibble - Union-Tribune
| | The stern of the APL Panama, which ran aground Sunday as it neared the port of Ensenada, was viewed yesterday by the curious. Tugs have failed to free it. (John Gibbins/Union-Tribune) |
Ensenada – It's a curious sight: a container vessel grounded like a wounded giant, dwarfing the crowds who gawk from a broad swath of beach just south of town.
Since it ran aground Christmas Day, the APL Panama has created a sensation in this laid-back port city. As salvage workers plot ways to float the vessel, and investigators try to understand what happened, the surrounding scene evokes a crowded plaza on a holiday, with vendors selling candy, families sharing picnics, couples holding hands.
They have been gathering by the hundreds alongside the stranded ship. They snap pictures, trade remarks, call out greetings. Or they simply stare at the APL Panama, about 880 feet long, the length of more than 60 adult California gray whales.
"It's like a giant party that you don't need an invitation to," Arcelia Paz, a 20-year-old psychology student from Ensenada, said yesterday. "It's like Mardi Gras."
The ship ran aground shortly after 6 p.m. Sunday as it prepared to enter Ensenada's port. Initial reports from the port suggested the crew tried to enter the access channel without waiting for a pilot to guide them. But the ship's owners, reached by telephone in Bremen, Germany, denied that possibility.
"The vessel was waiting for the pilot boat, and as it looks now, it drifted because of the strong current in that area," said Jens Meier-Hedde, managing director of the company that owns the ship, Mare Britannicum Schiffahrtsgesellschaft. "We are sure that the ship never tried to enter the harbor by itself."
The APL Panama was on a regularly scheduled route, contracted by a global container transportation company, APL, to carry goods across the Pacific. It had left Oakland and was making its first stop in Ensenada. Its regularly scheduled route leads to other Mexican ports, then to stops in Japan, Taiwan and China.
The ship is carrying primarily electronic goods and is about 80 percent full, Meier-Hedde said, and containers are stacked up to six or seven high.
The 25-member crew, which includes a Croatian captain, a Polish chief engineer and staff from Myanmar, suffered no injuries. The hull does not appear to be damaged, and the vessel is upright, but partially sunk into the sand.
Capt. José Luis Ríos Hernández, the Ensenada harbor master, had his first interview with the ship's captain yesterday.
"We're following the administrative steps, going by national and international norms," Ríos said. He would not discuss details of the discussion, citing the ongoing investigation.
He said the port is not to blame for what happened. He added that the incident has not interrupted port services. "Operations continue as normal, working perfectly."
The ship's owners have contracted the Crowley Maritime Corp., a worldwide salvage company based in Florida, to float the vessel. Three tugboats sent from Los Angeles made several attempts to dislodge it this week. Three more powerful tugs are on their way from Seattle, Meier-Hedde said, and are expected to arrive early next week.
Yesterday, a salvage master arrived from Scotland to oversee operations. "Hopefully, we'll get lucky and she'll come off fast," said David Stirling, standing by the ship. At the earliest, a new attempt to pull the ship won't be made until late next week, he said.
In preparation, workers must first unload the fuel – and that in itself will be a time-consuming, as it must be heated before it is pumped out, and only a small generator is working on the vessel, Stirling said. Attaching lines to the tugboats also will take time, he said.
The smaller tugs are now working to keep the ship from being carried even farther toward shore by the pounding surf.
"At the moment, we've got the highest tides of the month. From today, they get lower and lower, which makes it more and more difficult," Stirling said. "It's two weeks before it comes up to this level again."
In case the tugs fail, the company is preparing to send additional equipment from Louisiana, Stirling said, but that would take six weeks to arrive.
Judging from this week's interest, the salvage efforts will be closely followed, by schoolchildren and housewives, workers and vendors, even U.S. tourists driving by.
They are hungry to solve the mystery of this ship that missed the harbor and made Ensenada history.
Steve Menzer, 47, of Newbury Park, said he was down for the weekend, driving with with friends when they noticed the ship. "Think of all the people, waiting for their stuff to arrive, they're saying, 'Where's our container, where is it?"
Ana Patricia Ruiz, 11, an Ensenada resident, had a question of her own: "They had their route mapped out, so why did they end up here?"
San Diego Union-Tribune library researcher Michelle Gilchrist contributed to this report. |
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News Around the Republic of Mexico | December 2005 
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