Wijsmuller Salvage BV was awarded a pollution prevention contract within 24 hours of the sinking. The contract was placed by the owner's P&I Club. The task was to recover all pollutants from nine tanks containing Heavy Fuel Oil, together with four tanks holding Intermediate Fuel Oil and five containing diesel. The scope of the pump-out contract also included the removal of lubes and oily bilge water.

The removal of pollutants presented a challenge to the project team.

Hyundai No 105 lies at over 50m water depth.

The wreck site is very exposed, with strong currents. This limited diving operations to the slackwater period, about 30 to 40 minutes each day during spring tides. The only improvement came in the final stages of the operation, when conditions over a period of three days allowed up to five hours diving per day. Otherwise the dive time was limited to less than one hour. Things were made no easier by the fact that when she went down, Hyundai No 105 aligned herself with the current.

This meant that divers had little or no shelter from the force of the current, which ran from bow to stern and vice-versa. The problems were aggravated by the fact that the tides and currents were very erratic and often presented the project team with unpleasant surprises.

Wijsmuller mobilised a Salvage Master, an 18-strong diving team and four salvage technicians, drawn mainly from Wijsmuller companies in Singapore, Indonesia and the Netherlands. There was also a South Korean member of the team. His participation was very helpful in obtaining information on the location of the tanks from the Korean Master and Chief Engineer, who were still on scene.

The equipment spread included four barges with four-point moorings and the tug Kim Heng 77 . The project team included personnel from P.T. Salvindo, Wijsmuller's Indonesian partners.

Daan Koornneef, Wijsmuller Salvage Managing Director said, 'We began to hot-tap the bunker tanks, dealing first with those containing HFO. The oil was pumped to two receiving barges, the 'Sentek' and the 'Hiantek'.

We recovered around 1,000 tonnes of pollutants and began to demobilise on July 12. No pollution resulted during this pumpout operation. Under a separate contract, we maintain a presence on site, providing a guardship to warn passing traffic of the navigational hazard posed by the wreck.'

The hot-tap spread deployed for this project was used to drill over 30 stations, with each tank penetrated for the installation of 75 mm diameter suction and relief valves.

MJ Information No: 19830