The owners of a tug which crashed in the Western Isles while towing a huge oil rig, spilling fuel into the sea, will be pressed by a parliamentary committee today.
The UK Parliament’s transport select committee has launched a probe into the incident with questions being asked about why the captain of MV Alp Forward was towing the 17,300 tonne Transocean Winner in a storm on Monday, August 8.
Another focus for the committee – which is made up of six Conservative, four Labour and one SNP MP – is to look at the government’s controversial axing of a salvage tug service on the west coast of Scotland.
A committee statement said it will “examine the events that lead to the running aground of an offshore drilling platform, the Transocean Winner, on the Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, during its towed voyage from Norway to Malta in August 2016.
“The committee also looks into the subsequent salvage operation and how well the risks of environmental damage were managed.”
Some 30 ballast and fuel tanks were ruptured when the unmanned Transocean Winner grounded in Dalmore on the west side of Lewis, spilling fuel into the sea.
The previous day the redundant, 33-year-old rig was towed around the north of Lewis, tossing and twisting in heavy seas behind the tug.
Soon after 6pm, the skipper alerted coastguards it was in trouble.
In the early hours of the following morning the tow was overpowered by severe weather and the tow was broken.
The rig crashed onto rocks at 6.15am.
According to Transocean’s latest quarterly results up to the end of September, the salvage has racked up a bill of £17 million so far.
Costs of temporary repairs and removal could double that figure which apparently excludes the bulk of the loading operation in October – chartering tugs, transferring the rig onto a heavy lift vessel, its onward voyage, further repairs in Malta and its final load-off earlier this month at a scrap yard in Turkey.