Ship Refloats After Running Aground on Beach in Cornwall
Wednesday, August 03, 2011
At 04.30am, Falmouth Coastguard noted on their Automatic Identification system that the vessel was not using the traffic separation scheme correctly. All attempts were made to call the vessel by all means but the vessel went aground in the area of Cape Cornwall.
The ship had run aground on a beach at Cape Cornwall.
The Coastguard tug Anglian Princess was repositioned in case it was required and the St Ives and Sennen Cove lifeboats were requested to launch a rescue helicopter R193 was also scrambled.
Subsequently Falmouth Coastguard received a call 2 hours later from the master of the vessel reporting that he had managed to refloat the vessel after moving ballast water and using his engines to get the vessel off where she had beached. The vessel was carrying a cargo of containers and has 13 crew on board.
The vessel is now continuing on passage to Rotterdam under its own power and all units have now been stood down.
There has been no damage to the vessel, no pollution and no injuries to any of the crew.
Steve Huxley, Duty Area officer, Falmouth Coastguard said:
This has been a very fast moving scenario where this container vessel run aground on beach and with the rising tide and the master has managed to refloat the ship. It is now proceeding on its passage.
The Maritime & Coastguard Agency Press Office