Cargo Ship Oil Spill in Trinidad And Tobago

On the morning of 07 February, the Tobago Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) received a report of an abandoned capsized cargo ship approximately 150 to 200 metres south of Cove, Tobago. It was also reported that a thick, oil-like substance was washing up on nearby coastlines and spreading across Tobago's windward coastal waters.

The spill affected around 15 km of Tobago's coast, around one thousand volunteers joined to clean up the spill and divers worked to contain the leak from the overturned abandoned vessel. The ship was identified by divers as the "Gulfstream", but details about its origin, cause of grounding and potential casualties are unclear.

Trinidad and Tobago officials considered increasing the emergency level from a level 2 to a level 3 national as local resources were overwhelmed and international aid required.

Type of event
Oil Spill
Location of event
Trinidad And Tobago
Date of Charter Activation
2024-02-10
Time of Charter Activation
16:35
Time zone of Charter Activation
UTC-04:00
Charter Requestor
Office of Disaster Preparedness and Management
Activation ID
861
Project Management
Roopnarine Cassie (The Office of Disaster Preparedness and Management)
Value Adding
  • Konstantin Homenkov (Geoinformation Systems),
  • Laercio Massaru Namikawa (INPE),
  • Willem Vorster (SANSA),
  • Juan Velasco (NOAA),
  • Nikia Gooding (Institute of Marine Affairs),
  • Jamie Stovin-Bradford (ITOPF),
  • Veronique Pinard (Environment and Climate Change Canada),
  • Mitchell Dayreon (Tobago Emergency Management Agency),
  • Grahame Niles (The Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH)),
  • Copernicus EMS

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