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| Cosco Busan operator fined US$10 million for Frisco spill |
| Time：2010-2-24 Read：4363 |
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THE operating company of the containership, the Cosco Busan, that crashed into a tower of the San Francisco Bay Bridge in November 2007 in heavy fog has been fined US$10 million for its role in the spill of 53,000 gallons of oil that fouled miles of shoreline and killed more than 2,400 birds, reports the San Francisco Chronicle.
This comes after Fleet Management Ltd pleaded guilty in August 2009 to a misdemeanour charge of water pollution and two felony counts of filing false documents with the government to conceal its actions. A US District Judge ordered the company to pay $8 million to the government and $2 million to a fund for environmental projects in San Francisco Bay, the report said.
The sentencing completed criminal proceedings arising from the crash of the Cosco Busan that government agencies estimated triggered a cleanup operation costing at $70 million.
The report noted that the ship's pilot, John Cota, pleaded guilty to federal pollution charges in March 2009 and was sentenced to 10 months in prison. Federal prosecutors said both Cota and Fleet Management were at fault. The pilot was criticised for deciding to sail in the fog and ignoring danger signals, the company for failing to train the crew or notify Cota when the ship went off course.
The company's "systemic management failures played a significant role in causing the Cosco Busan disaster and they compounded the problem by attempting to cover up their conduct," Ignacia Moreno, head of the Justice Department's Environmental and Natural Resources Division, was quoted as saying after the sentencing.
In a ruling in January by another federal judge could require Fleet Management and Regal Stone Ltd, the Cosco Busan's owner, to pay for damage caused by Cota's negligence as well as their own, the report added. |
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