South Korea’s Supreme Court dismissed charges against the master and chief officer last month, but kept the pair in the country awaiting a lower court decision that the charges against them should be dismissed.
The widely backed lobby for the release of the Hebei Two had expressed fears that a lower court decision to dismiss the case could take anything up to six months.
According to Satnam Kumar, V.Ships' Asia managing director of ship management, there was a hearing of the lower court in Korea on Tuesday.
The case is due to be heard again on June 11, with the lower court affirming that the charges should be dropped.
“We are confident by that time they will be able to return to India,” V.Ships president Roberto Giorgi said.
The pair have not been allowed to leave South Korea since the very large crude carrier Hebei Spirit was holed by a crane barge and spilled oil in December 2007.
In short, on December 7, 2007, a Samsung barge broke free from its tugboats and collided with the anchored Hebei Spirit, spilling 10,800 tonnes of oil into the waters off Taean, and though the tugboat captains were found primarily responsible, the two Indian captain and chief officer of the Hebei Spirit were sentenced to 18-month and 8-month sentences, respectively. They were not only essentially held accountable for simply being there, they were, you might say, held accountable for being foreign. More information on Free the Hebei Spirit.
6 comments:
Does anyone understand how large a VLCC is? A VLCC is the second largest ship EVER made. It doesnt turn quickly, as you can imagine. The Koreans just didnt want to appear as total retards in the oil spill. But they are. The barge was 10% at fault. Like last year when a Korean ship hit the Bay Bridge in San Francisco...the bridge was not moving at the time. Koreans cant fly planes, drive cars, pilot ships, walk without bumping into you, ride bicycles....they are retarded. These poor Indians spent time in prison for the crime of being in Korean waters. It is an outrage.
A VLCC is a tanker that holds, give or take, 300,000 tons of oil. It's the second largest CLASS of ship out there; there are hundreds of VLCC's afloat but only a few ULCC's (Ultra Large Crude Carriers), the next largest class at 400,000 tons capacity.
The Hebei Spirit was anchored when it was hit by the Samsung barge. So there was absolutly nothing that the Hebei crew could do to prevent the collision. Pulling anchor on a ship like this is an evolution that takes at least an hour.
Keep in mind that even if the Hebei Two were released after 'time served', a criminal conviction would probably have ended their seafaring careers. So the idea of letting them go with a conviction but without serving the entire sentence would be disastrous for them.
And note that the Cosco Busan (which hit the bay bridge in SF) was crewed by Chinese, not Koreans.
Cosco = China Ocean Shipping Company
Only the name was Korean.
so.........were they illegally anchored? Why would they go to jail if they were just sitting there?
They were not anchored illegally. The officers were charged because something bad happened and there were foreigners around to take the blame.
But slightly more seriously, they were charged because they did not take action quickly enough.
Didn't they also give false testimony or something? (I'm trying to find a link.)
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