Hebei Spirit pollution claims to top 100,000

IOPC Fund director Willem Oosterveen said the organisation has had to speed up the introduction of its new web-based claims management system to cater for the flow of claims arising from the incident.
In comparison, the Erika spill resulted in about 7,000 claims and the Solar 1 some 32,000.
Writing in the IOPC Fund’s annual review, Mr Oosterveen said that one of the biggest challenges the organisation had to face was the “increasing complexity of incidents and the sheer number of individual claims that have to be handled”.
Much of South Korea’s west coast was affected by the oil spill, which resulted in a total of 10,900 tonnes of oil being spilled.
South Korea is a signatory of the 1992 civil liability and fund conventions, but is not a signatory of the supplementary fund.
The total amount available for compensation under the two conventions is SDR203m, a figure likely to be exceeded by losses resulting from the spill.
SDR89.8m is available from the owner’s insurer, Skuld, with a further SDR113.2m available from the IOPC Fund.
According to the IOPC Fund, investigations into the incident suggest that negligence by the crane barge involved in the collision with the tanker and the three towing tugs was the substantive cause of the collision.
There are grounds to deny the crane barge’s owner, Samsung Heavy Industries, the right to limit its liability.
Skuld and the 1992 Fund have commenced recourse action against Samsung Heavy in the Ningbo Maritime Court in China, with the fund claiming US$200m in addition to a claim for US$200m from the Hebei Spirit’s owner, Hebei Spirit Shipping, and Skuld.
Jerry Rysanek, chairman of the 1992 Fund Assembly, said that while the financial crisis had caused major problems for many organisations, the funds had “weathered the storm” without any investment losses. Total claims expenditure for the 1971 Fund was £158,300 (US$241,540) in 2008.
Total claims expenditure for the 1992 Fund was £10.7m, with total income of £58.9m.
Total income for the supplementary fund was £58,200.
The IOPC Fund announced a crackdown on member states that failed to submit oil reports in October last year.
It is financed by members that import oil or heavy fuel oil and failure to submit reports of how much oil has been received has been a problem for many years.
As of April 28, 2009, states with oil reports outstanding will have compensation payments deferred.
All legitimate claims made by other victims including other public authorities in the state will be unaffected by the policy, the fund said.