745-foot propane tanker crashes into Intalco pier at Cherry Point, officials confirm
A 745-foot tanker carrying highly flammable materials collided with a gas terminal pier used by Alcoa Intalco Works more than a week ago, The Bellingham Herald has confirmed.
U.S. Coast Guard officials said Monday, Dec. 23, that the tanker Levant, carrying 33,000 tons of propane and butane, crashed into Intalco’s pier at Cherry Point with enough force to punch a hole in the ship.
“It compromised the watertight integrity of their hull,” said Petty Officer 3rd Class Trevor Lilburn in Astoria, Ore.
No one was injured and none of the ship’s cargo leaked, Lilburn told The Herald.
The extent of the damage was unknown and no damage estimates were given for the pier or the ship, Lilburn said.
It happened at 4:10 a.m Saturday, Dec. 14, as the Levant approached the T-shaped pier west of Ferndale that is owned by Petrogas Pacific LLC and leased by the Intalco aluminum smelting plant.
Officials at Petrogas and Intalco weren’t immediately available for comment.
State Department of Ecology spokesman Ty Keltner said officials were told about the incident but took no action.
”There wasn’t any kind of a spill,” Keltner told The Herald. “There’s not anything that we’d be involved in. We were notified, but there wasn’t a spill or any reason for us to be out there.”
Lilburn said the Coast Guard was leading the investigation but the results weren’t expected for some time.
He called the mishap an “allision,” a maritime term for when a vessel hits a fixed object.
“It’s a serious situation even though there was no harm to life or limb or the environment,” Lilburn said. “If they were doing anything wrong, we’ll take the necessary steps from there.”
The Levant is an LPG tanker owned and managed by Frontline 2012 of Hamilton, Bermuda, and sailing under the flag of Marshall Islands, according to vesselfinder.com and balticshipping.com. It was built in 2015 by Jiangnan Changxing Shipbuilding of Shanghai, China.
It’s currently in Port Angeles, where divers were inspecting its hull, Lilburn said.
Lilburn said Levant officials initially blamed the weather for the incident.
Justin Pullin of the National Weather Service in Seattle said Bellingham International Airport reported fog and some rain showers in the predawn hours of Dec. 14, which could have hampered visibility.
Meteorological records show there was a 10.3-foot high tide at 7:58 a.m. Dec. 14, 2019, for Cherry Point.
This story was originally published December 23, 2019 at 3:56 PM.
