Sea Prince Incident and Changes of Response
Scheme after the Incident

Mr. Lee Bong-Gil

Director of Marine Pollution Surveillance Division
Korea National Maritime Police Agency

1. Introduction

The Sea Prince Oil Spill Incident which was occurred in South Coast of Republic ofKorea in July 1995 was one of the biggest oil pollution incidents that Republic of Korea hasever been experienced, so far. Due to the incident, both Korean Government and it’speople came to recognize the seriousness that oil pollution impacted to marine environment.
Thus, Republic of Korea has been proceeded establishment of response system such as
improvement of national response regimes, enhancement of national oil recovery capability,
etc in order to prepare to similar a large oil pollution incidents. Since it is difficult for anindividual State to respond effectively to mass oil pollution incident, Republic of Korea also
recognized necessity of international cooperation establishment and acceded to the OPRC
Convention on November 1999 and has been actively participating in the North-west Pacific
Action Plan(NOWPAP) Projects launched on September 1994 by Member Statescomposed of Republic of Korea, Japan, People's Republic of China and Russian Federation,in order to positively cooperate to establishment of such cooperation system.

2. Sea Prince Incident
2.1 Outline of Incident
Crude oil carrier, Sea Prince which arrived at off-shore jetty of Kwang-Yang Port inSouth Coast of Republic of Korea on 22 July 1995, was discharging 260,000 tons of crude
oil loaded at Nastanu Port of Soudi-Arabia on 28 June 1995.
After receiving a Typhoon Warning Message during discharge work of cargo oil, the ship
began to shift herself to safety bay in order to avoid the Typhoon without delay at 6 P.M on
22 July 1995. On the way of shifting, the ship firstly collided with a small rock island near Sori
Island due to harsh weather and consequently fire occurred in it’s engine room, causing tostop main engine. Thus, the exultant Typhoon dragged the weak ship in it's own way and lastly
had the ship grounding on submerged-rock of Sori Island twenty-seven miles away from

Gwang-yang Port at 4 P.M on 23 July 1995. After all, this incident resulted in oil spill of
5,035 tons including fuel oil.
Weather condition at that time was under A Class Typhoon Warning with wind speed of
40 m/sec and wave height of 8-10 meters.

Table. 1 Particulars of the Incident Ship
Ship`s Name

Size

Crew

Nationality

Sea Prince

144,567 Ton(G/T)

20 Persons

Cyprus(Oil Tanker) Length 313m
Wide 56m

Oil on Board (kl)Total : 88,481 kl
Crude Oil : 86,886kl
Bunker C : 1,495kl
Bunker A : 100kl

2.2 Response Actions taken

2.2.1 The Polluted Extent
Spilt oil from the ship was spread to the extent of 127 miles along coasts of Geo-je,
Pusan, Ulsan and Po-hang from 15 miles off Sori Island. The thin oil was discovered evenat sea of 20 miles away from West Coast of Tsushima Island of Japan. It pollutted 73 km ofshorelines along many islands in South Coast of Republic of Korea, shorelines in Jeon-Nam
Province(47km), and those in Pusan and Gyung-Nam Province(26km). In pariticular, it wasvery serious in the area of Sori Island, and large amount of tar balls were stranded to thebeaches of Pusan and Ulsan.
2.2.2 Initial Actions
The Typhoon, Fay, was A Class Typhoon which had 940 hpa in air pressure of center,
890 km in diameter, 40 m/sec in wind velocity and 8-10 meters in wave height. The laid shipon submerged rock was fired in her engine room, and there were high possibilities that fire ofengine room might be transferred to cargo tank and might be resulted hull explosion since thefire was being magnified.
Under the Typhoon Warning Condition, a salvage & patrol ship in Pusan Maritime Police
Station, which is 3,000 tons(G/T) class, arrived on the site in spite of high wave at 4 P.M on
24 July, and carried out fire-fighting for four hours and twenty minutes and the fire was
successfully suppressed after all. Thanks to such a successful fire-fighting, it was possible not
only to prevent firing to cargo tanks and to transfer most of cargo oil to barges, but also toprevent huge oil spill of cargo 88,000 tons.
With the turn of smoth weather in evening of that day, Korea National Maritime Police
Agency(KNMPA) deployed oil boom 864 meters around the ship mobilizing oil recovery
ships, but considerable quantity of oil already had escaped to open sea. Due to heigh wave,
actual oil recovery works at sea could be started on 25 July.
2.2.3 Oil Recovery Works at Sea
Oil recovery works at sea were started on a large scale on 25 July 1995, however, there
were many difficulties for oil spill response to need lots of personnel and equipment since thespilt oil had already spread to wide sea area. So KNMPA had to mobilize ships, equipment
and materials for oil recovery in national wide, which were owned by KNMPA, relevant
authorities and private companies. Maximum 500 Ships including fishing boats a day were
mobilized to deal with oil spill.
A quantity of oil (1,390? ) was recovered by large size skimmers such as trawl skimmer andscrew skimmer, however, clean-up operations by absorbent and dispersant were mainly
carried out since most of spilt oil was spread to wide sea and most of the ships, KNMPA's
patrol ships and fishing boats, were not oil recovery ships. On the other hand, aerial
dispersant spray to open sea was carried out by Helicopters and a C-130 Hercules assistedfrom EARL of Singapore, but over-spray of dispersant in this method became hot issue in
Press and Political Circle later. Clean-up operations at sea were carried out for nineteen days
from 25 July to 11 August 1995.
2.2.4 Clean-up Operation at Shoreline
Spilt oil at sea was widely stranded to shorelines of 38 coastal villages of Jeon-Nam
Province and 13 coastal villages of Pusan and Gyung-Nam Province. Methods of oil recovery

by screw skimmers and portable high pressure pumps were firstly used in order to recover the
stranded thick oil in the shorelines of Sori Island, and oil mixtures and the weathered oil wererecovered by mechanical methods using boats for sweep and vehicles for wastes recovery
and hand methods using shovels and gourdes mobilizing residents, Police Strike Units andMilitaries. For the adhered oil to rocks and stones, it was cleaned up using absorbents anddusters. For the sand and graves sucked oil, it was used a cleaning method that was washedby dispersant after excavators recover the polluted sand and graves. Like this, oil recovery
works by mechanical methods were carried out mainly around Sori Island which was mostseriously polluted, however, the works in the other areas were managed manually by residents.
Thus many personnel and much time for clean-up operation were needed.
Especially, since it was Summer Season, the spilt oil penetrated more deeply to graves andthe soil and that became to a cause arsing many difficulties for clean-up operations.
Clean-up operations at shoreline were carried out for five months from 25 July to 31
December 1995.

Table 2. Status of the mobilized personnel and equipment for clean-up operations( From 24 July 1995 to 31 December 1995)
Sources

Total

Personnel

Ship Aircraft

Skimmer

Oil Boom Absorbent
(m)

(kg)

Dispersant(kl)

166,905 8,295

45

126

13,766239,678

717

KNMPA

15,525

826

21

120

864

65,514302

Relevant

21,340

574

22

2

670

35,81551

130,040 6,895

2

4

12,322

138,349

363

Authorities
Civil

The recovered Quantity- Waste oil : 1,396 kl-

Wastes : 3,364 tons

Cost of Clean-up and Damaged (exchange rate at present)- Cost of clean-up : fifteen million dollars- Damages (cost required by fishermen) : sixty million dollars

2.3 The Response Capability and Problems at that time

2.3.1 Weakness in National Response Capability(NRC)
The National Response Capability(NRC) at that time of Sea Prince Incident was very frail.
KNMPA had merely ten oil recovery boats less than 140 tons class(G/T), thirty four oilskimmers, seven kilometers oil boom and other materials such as dispersant and absorbent
needed only for initial action. It was more frail in private level than KNMPA, which oil
refinery companies owned merely two small oil recovery boats and Contractors for oilclean-up owned small quantity of dispersant and absorbent, thus, NRC was merely 1,200
tons.

2.3.2 Poor Clean-up Efficiency due to the Ununified Command System
At that time, responsibilities of authorities to oil spill response were divided into the Sea
Transportation Agency, Provinces, Cities and KNMPA according to scales of the spilt
quantity and sea areas of jurisdiction. So, in spite of mobilization of maximum 500 ships a day,clean-up efficiency was very low since there was not a unified command system.

2.3.3 Social Problems like Post-Pollution, etc due to Poor Specializationof Clean-up Operation
Although oil recovery works in a mechanical method using trawl skimmers and screw
skimmers were done around Sori Island that was seriously polluted, most of total 8,295
fishing boats mobilized during clean-up period had to carry out clean-up operations by

using

only dispersant and absorbent since there were not alternative ways. After all, such clean-up
operations caused some problems such as over-spray from scanty of specialization andrecognition in dispersant application, and post-pollution from the missing of thrownabsorbents.

2.4 Lesson of the Sea Prince Incident

2.4.1 Recognition of Seriousness of Damages by Oil Pollution
After Sea Prince Incident occurred, each Newspapers and Broadcastings reported ascover story everyday showing the scenes that dark oil was being spread. They explainedsome examples of foreign countries and pointed out the seriousness of it’s damages. All thepeople and Government officials who saw such scenes came to recognized seriousness of thedamages by oil pollution.

2.4.2 Recognition of Weakness of National Response Regime and System
Before the Incident, it was true that order of budget formation for purchase of response
equipment was inferior and there were not efforts for mi provement of response regimes.
Many problems were found through the Incident and Government was blamed from thePresses, environment experts, politicians, etc. Thus, it was a turning point for the Government
to seek countermeasures of oil spill response.

2.4.3 Warning to the Possibility of Oil Spill Incident more than 10,000 tons
in Republic of Korea
At the incident time, oil of 5,035 tons was spilt from the ship, however, 88,481 tons of oil
were still remained in the hull. As below figure 1, middle part of the hull was damaged bysubmerged rock. Also the hull was continuously hit by harsh wind and wave, being fired inengine room. So there were high risks that the hull might be divided in two parts and all cargo
oil might be spilt out by hull explosion on the way for fires to develope, however fortunately
the fire was suppressed just before such large oil spill. Thus, it was possible to transfer cargo
oil into storage barges after fixing the hull. We were able to avoid the worst situation.

It was a warning that huge oil spill more than 10,000 tons or 100,000 tons could happen
in Republic of Korea as those of foreign countries.

Quantity of loaded oil : 88,481 kl (Crude Oil 86,886kl, Bunker C 1,495kl, Bunker A 100kl)

Surface
Of SeaSubmerged rock

Rupture : Height 16.4m
Width 10m, Length 0.3m

Ruptured as “T” Shape
Width 50cm, length 20cm

Fig. 1 Drawing of ruptured situation of Sea Prince by grounding

3. Improvement of National Response Policy since Sea Prince Incident

3.1 Improvement of Response System as Model of the Advanced Countries

3.1.1 Establishment of Response Command System giving Response Control to
KNMPA
The Government of Republic of Korea unified the related works in cotrol of several
authorities with oil spill response into KNMPA and set it’s legal basis on establishment of the
Response Countermeasure Head-Quarter(RCHQ) which the Commissioner of KNMPA
become Chairman of that, so that he can overall take control of personnel and equipment at
response scene.

3.1.2 Establishment of National Contingency Plan according to Standard of the
OPRC Convention
According to necessity of a synthetic plan establishment for preparedness and response
to disaster by mass oil pollution in national-wide since Sea Prince Incident and requirement of
establishment of National Contingency Plan in ratifying the OPRC Convention, Republic ofKorea began to establish the Plan in 1998 and the prepared Plan by two years wasdeliberated and settled at the Cabinet Meeting on 11 January 2000.
This Plan was established basing the OPRC Convention and accepting domestic Laws
such as the Law on Marine Pollution Prevention, the Law on National Disaster Control, etc.
Also this Plan systematically defines all the items on response of oil pollution incident such asorganization and command system of national response, establishment of the Regional
Contingency Plan, mapping of Environment Sensitive Index(ESI) Map, arrangement andmaintenance of response equipment, choice of response method and the Scientific Support
Unit(SSU) for pollution response advice, investigation of damages and restoration, duty ofeach authoritiy, protection of fishing areas and relief of wildlife, etc.

3.1.3 Establishment of Regional Contingency Plan fitted to Characteristics of each
Sea Area
In accordance with establishment of National Contingency Plan, also the Project forestablishment of Regional Contingency Plan was began in 1999 in order to regionally prepare
and respond to marine pollution, which defines reponse organization and procedures,
preparations, etc including ESI map.
Especially, ESI maps is being made as a method that relevant information, fishing andaquaculture area, type of shorelines, resources of tour, location of important facilities, etc, aremarked on the digitalized sea chart, considering International Guideline and regional situations.
So the completed ESI maps will be effectively used for decision of shoreline protection
priority and effective response method in case of large pollution incident.
KNMPA has been proceeding the Project for establishment of Regional Contingency
Plan since 1999, which was divided whole Korean waters into twelve parts and entrusted

with Research Institute. In 2000, the Plans to Inchon and Yeosu area that are frail in oil
pollution were firstly completed. At present, the Plans to Pusan, Ulsan and Tong-young areas
are being made and the Plans to all the waters will be completed by 2002.

3.1.4 Establishment of Support System by Response Experts
The Scientific Support Unit(SSU) for advice of response technique and research ofscientific response method was established in 1997 according to the revised Law on Marin
Pollution Prevention. The members of SSU is nominated by the Commissioner of KNMPA,
and SSU is composed of twenty-eight experts in six devided field from nine ResearchInstitutes at present.

3.2 Reinforcement of National Response Capability

3.2.1 Reinforcement of KNMPA's Response Equipment
Since Sea Prince Incident, Republic of Korea has been reinforcing National Response
Capability(NRC) targeting 20,000 tons of oil recovery capability, allocating 10,000tons for
Government(KNMPA), 5,000tons for KMPRC and 5,000tons for privatecompanies.

KNMPA had planned a Five Years Plan for reinforcement of response equipment and has
been proceeding the Plan. Consequently, response capability was remarkably reinforced thanprevious.
Followings are additionally increased;-

Eight oil recovery ships(five ships of 300 gross ton class, three ships of
500 gross ton class)-

Thirty-two oil skimmers- Three oil storage barges- Eleven kilometers oil boom
- Forty officials of response field in KNMPA.

Table. 3 Status of KNMPA's Response Capability since Sea Prince Incident

At the Incident

February 2001

Tarket by 2004

Time
Oil Recovery Ship

10

18

23

Oil Skimmers

34

71

84

Oil Boom(km)

7

19

30 km

Oil Storage Barge-3

6 (500G/T Class)

Capability of Recovery

1,200

5,100

10,000(kl)
Response Personnel

140

180

220

(official)

Note : NRC was calculated with following considerations such as efficiency,
mobilization efficiency and operating capability of response personnel after
calculating mechanical recovery capability of oil recovery ships and oilskimmers.
NRC(kl) = Recovery Capacity(kl/h) x Working Hours(3days x 8 hours/day)x Mechanical Efficiency(0.2) x Mobilization Efficiency(0.33)
x Operating Efficiency(0.65)
Also it was targeted as 20,000 tons, which was calculated as one third of 60,000tons ofmaximum spill in case of pollution incident of 200,000tons(Contingency Planning Guide of IPIECA).

3.2.2 Reinforcement of Response Capability in Civil Level
In order to reinforce response capability in Civil Level, Republic of Korea establishedMarine Pollution Response Corporation (KMPRC) on 13 November 1997, putting legal
basis in the Law on Marine Pollution Prevention. At present, KMPRC is composed of fourdepartments and ten branches with 398 staffs, and Members of that are composed ofninety-seven companies as follows- Five oil refinery companies- Seven oil storage facility companies-

Sixty-seven oil shipping companies- Seventeen non-tanker shipping companies

KMPRC's activities are as follows.
-

Oil spill response operation and collecting oily waste from vessel and oil storage
facialities- Stockpiling and rental service response equipment and materials.
- Maintaining and stationing oil recovery vessels- Implementing projects entrusted by the central or local Government- Operating port cleaning vessel and waste oil storage facilities- Research and development oil spill response technology, etc.

Also response capability of the clean-up Contractors has considerably raised for recent
few years according to registration of twenty-three Contractors by registration regime forclean-up business.

Table.4 Status of National Response Capability (February 2001)

Oil Recovery

Oil Skimmer

Boat

Oil Boom

Response(km)

Capability(ton)

Total

105

191

228

12,300

KNMPA

18

71

19

5,100

KMPRC

49

75

29

4,600

Others

36

42

180

2,600

3.3 Strengthening of Training and Exercise

Since Sea Prince Incident, KNMPA and relevant Research Institutes, in order to raisecapability of response adaptation, have been providing response personnel with various
training programs such as operational level courses for scene responders, administrative levelcourses for on-scene commanders and managers, oversea training courses, etc.
Also KNMPA has been raising adaptation capabilities to the National Contingency Plan
and the Regional Contingency Plans through the joint exercises conducted by Civil andAuthorities, and has been continuously improving problems coming from such exercises.

3.4 Promotion of Response Technology Development
Concerns to technology development in the response field has been magnified since
Sea Prince Incident, and it has been actively proceeding many researches and developments
such as the Response Supporting System(RSS) of oil spill incident, the Oil Spill Prediction
Model to oil spill incident in Research Institutes, many kinds of absorbent and dispersant inprivate companies, etc.
RSS has beens developing by the Korea Ocean Research and Development Institute(KORDI) in cooperation with KNMPA and Pu-kyung University. The Oil Spill Prediction
Models, which were developed by KNMPA, KORDI and Pu-kyung University respectively,
are being used for response operation predicting oil spread in case of pollution incident.
On other hand, various equipment and materials, which are oil skimmer, oil boom,
absorbent and dispersant, have been developing and commercializing.

Table.5 Status of Development of Response Equipment, Materials and Dispersant
Total

Ship

Skimmer

Boom Absorbent

Companies

67

1

3

12

Kinds

106

1

6

23

Dispersant

Gel

39

9

3

61

13

3

3.5 Establishment of International Response Cooperation System

3.5.1 Accession to OPRC Convention
Republic of Korea improved response regimes and established National Contingency
Plan under the procedures required to join to OPRC Convention, and acceded to theConvention on 9 November 1999. The Convention in Republic of Korea entered into force
on 9 February 2000.

3.5.2. Active Participation in NOWPAP Projects
According to the recommendation of United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP),
Northwest Pacific Action Plan(NOWPAP) for protection, management and development of
the marine and coastal environment of Northwest Pacific Region, which was agreed by five
Member States, was launched by holding the First Intergovernmental Meeting on September
1994, in Seoul, Republic of Korea.
In order to effectively proceed this Plan, the priority projects of six areas were designatedand inter-alia the NOWPAP/4 Project for development of effective measures for regional
cooperation in marine pollution preparedness and response is being most actively proceeded
and the Forum Meeting for proceeding of NOWPAP/4 Project is held by Member States inturn and the First, Second and Third Forum Meetings were held in Toyama, Japan, on July
1997, in Taejon, Republic of Korea on May 1998 and in Yuzno-Sakhalinsk, RussianFederation on July 1999, respectively.
Initial Tasks in the field of marine pollution preparedness and response as Forum Projects
were almost accomplished and two important Projects, the NOWPAP Contingency Plan thatdefines

joint

response

procedures

byMemberStatesandMemorandumof

Understanding(MOU) that defines basic principles of response cooperation in case of massoil pollution incident, are being proceeded and actively discussed among Member States.
With regard to legal status of the MOU, although there are different views more or less,Member States are making efforts to establish a substantial cooperation system.
On other hand, the Marine Environmental Emergency Preparedness and Response

Regional Activity Center(MER/RAC), which was established in Taejon, Republic of Korea
on 22 March 2000, has been doing it's activity works and four staffs of that are making efforts
to establish a response cooperation system in this Region.

3.5.3 Proceeding of Response Agreement Conclusion between Republic of Korea
and China
Necessity of response cooperation system to marine pollution incidents between Republicof Korea and China has been raised according to that sea traffic has been increased inaccordance with industrialization in China and tendency of development of West-Coastal
Zones in Republic of Korea and consequently danger of sea casualties have been increased
more and more.
Republic of Korea and China agreed with each other to conclude the Agreement on Oil
Pollution Preparedness, Response and Cooperation in Yellow Sea in accordance with theagreement that was done at a Summit Conference between two States when President, Kim
Dae-Jung, visited in China in November 1998.
In order to conclude the Agreement, two States have been contacting each othersince1999. Being prepared and discussed Draft Text of the Agreement at present, it isexpected that the Agreement will be soon concluded.
3.5.4

Regular Joint Exercise between Republic of Korea and Japan.

KNMPA and Japan Coast Guard agreed to hold the Joint Exercise for rescue andoilspill response every year in turn every year according to the Arrangement that two Agencies
agreed to jointly cooperate to sea crimes and casualties in April 1999. On the basis of thisArrangement, the First Joint Exercise, which was consisted of contents such as oil pollution
response, fire suppression, rescue and salvage under the assumption of sea casualty, washeld in Pusan Port of Republic of Korea in October 1999, and the Second Exercise was
successively held in Moji Port of Japan in September 2000. This Exercise has a very
important meaning as a commencement of substantial cooperation among neighboring States
and as a arrangement of basis of cooperation promotion within the framework of OPRC
Convention and NOWPAP.

4. Conclusion

Sea Prince Incident caused much damages and gave us pains, however it was a turning
point that gave us an epochal opportunity to improvement of response system in Republic ofKorea. All the people in Republic of Korea recognized the seriousness of oil pollution
damages and the weakness of National Response Capability through this Incident. It also let
us know that Republic of Korea has possibility of huge oil pollution more than Sea Prince
Incident. As a result, we came to have a chance to check and analyse problems from
response works. It was true that everything, which were organization of response, command
system, response capability, response technology, international cooperation system, etc, were
not arranged before the Incident.
We have established response systems on a level with the Advanced Countries throughimprovement of laws and regimes, reconstruction of response organization and command
system, reinforcement of equipment and personnel, accession to International Convention,
establishment of National Contingency Plan and Regional Contingency Plan. We are now
improving capability of response implementation, focusing on the scheme of how the arranged
equipment can be appropriately used and how NCP and RCP can be effectively applied foran actual situation.
In the near future, risks of marine oil pollution incident would be increased with theincrease of sea traffic in coastal water of Korean Peninsula.

Therefore it is very importantthat international cooperative system among neighboring States like Japan, China and Russia
is firmly established, as well as improvement of response capability in Republic of Korea.