page_title: North Mole, Gibraltar Harbour
section_title: Recent history
hierarchical_section_title: North Mole, Gibraltar Harbour / Recent history
caption_attribution_description: On 31 May 2011 an Oil Sullage Tank exploded at Gibraltar Port next to a cruise liner visiting Gibraltar. The ensuing fire took firefighters 18 hours to put out.
context_page_description: The North Mole is a breakwater located in the northern section of Gibraltar Harbour, in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar, at the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula. The North Mole, with the rest of harbour, is just north of the east entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar. The breakwater was formerly known as the Commercial Mole, and is the site of the commercial port in the harbour. It was the consequence of a late nineteenth century plan by the British Admiralty to create a modern dockyard and large defensive harbour in Gibraltar.
context_section_description: On the afternoon of 31 May 2011, the North Mole at Gibraltar Harbour was the site of an explosion involving an oil storage tank. Two workers had been welding on top of the tank. In addition to injuries sustained by the workers, one of whom was extensively burned, there were also injuries suffered by twelve passengers on the cruise ship MS Independence of the Seas, which had been berthed at the North Mole. An adjacent tank caught fire that evening, which required evacuation of the land-based fire fighters, limiting access to the fire from the sea. Following the fire, concern was expressed about the availability of adequate supplies of fire-fighting foam prior to the blaze at the North Mole.
  On 8 June 2012, a bunkering accident off the North Mole resulted in an oil spill, with the release of three tons of fuel into the sea. The refueling operation had involved the ship Frio Dolphin and the bunker tanker Vemaoil XX. The Gibraltar Oil Spill Contingency Plan was activated and, by the following day, most of the spilled oil had been contained.
caption: Oil Sullage Tank continues burning through the night
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