Recovery

The title of this post is recovery, as opposed to salvage. Work at Astrolabe Reef is the grinding and unglamorous task of recovering waterlogged containers and their contents which for the most part have been submerged in sea water for almost five months.

A twenty foot shipping container when loaded has a tare weight of about 2.5 tonnes and cargo weight of 25 tonnes give or take. The combined effects of being waterlogged and damage to their structural strength has resulted in many of the boxes simply folding when they are pulled out of the Rena's holds by Smit Borneo.

The sequence below is the contents of a container carrying Mitavite Breeda as it is drawn out of the submerged cargo hold.

The Salvors were reduced to slitting open the bags of the waterlogged and decomposing horse feed, recovering the plastic wrappers and giving the fish a free lunch.

That's all the news today from Astrolabe Reef.

The Antipodean Mariner