VIDEO: Burned out car carrier towed to Eemshaven

Fremantle Highway was towed to Eemshaven after salvors determined fire had been extinguished. [Photo: Netherlands Coast Guard]

The Fremantle Highway is now moored alongside in the Dutch port of Eemshaven. The decision to tow the burned out car carrier to the port was made after it was determined that the fire aboard the vessel that broke out July 25 was completely extinguished. One person died in the incident and two were injured.

The tow got underway around 5.00 a.m. this morning, local time, with the ship being towed by two tugs and accompanied by the Netherlands Coast Guard vessel Guardian and the Rikswaterstaat oil response vessel Arca.

Rijkswaterstaat, which is part of the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, says that, with the vessel docked the owner of the vessel, Shoei Kisen “remains responsible for the further handling of the cargo and everything that goes with it.”

Shoei Kisen, which last made the sort of headlines no ship operator wants to have as the owner of the Ever Given, said it is “planning to investigate the cause of the accident in cooperation with relevant parties.”

Many questions remain to be answered about the incident, not least the number of EVs (electric vehicles) aboard. Some reports have put that number at nearly 500 and a sound clip has surfaced in which a responder is heard saying that the fire broke out in an EV.

Bloomberg today quoted Boskalis CEO Peter A. M. Berdowski as saying that “the fire started in some of the top decks. We assume the eighth deck, that’s in a very poor state. Part of it is completely collapsed and it’s heavily, heavily destructed,” and, “We don’t know what the source was of the fire.Having said that, I think all experts with any knowledge on this topic agree that the transportation of electric vehicles introduces additional risks.”

Among those experts, of course, is insurer Allianz, which published an expert risk briefing on the topic last month.

The state of the burned out car carrier when it arrived in Eemshaven this morning can be seen in the video. Meantime, its captain remains in hospital in the Netherlands. The other person injured in the fire, the pilot, has been released from hospital.