UN Launches Crowdfund Campaign To Avert Red Sea Oil Spill
The United Nations on Monday launched a crowdfund campaign to avert an oil spill from the FSO Safer, the floating oil storage and offloading vessel that has been moored since 1988 in the Red Sea 31 miles (50 kilometers) northwest of the Yemeni city of Al Hudaydah, a UN spokesman said. UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen David Gressly on Monday announced the social media campaign’s launch “to raise the necessary funds to start the emergency operation to transfer the oil from the FSO Safer to a safe temporary vessel,” Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres, said at a press briefing.
“Following Saudi Arabia’s announcement of a $10 million pledge on June 12 and the United States’ announcement that it is working toward a $10 million contribution, the world body now has three-quarters of the $80 million required to start the emergency operation,” said Dujarric.
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The Netherlands and the UN co-hosted a pledging conference on May 11 that raised around $40 million of the funds needed.
The UN estimates that the overall cost of its plan is about $144 million, including the long-term replacement of the vessel.
The decaying, dilapidated supertanker has been described as a “floating time-bomb” that risks causing an explosion or an oil spill in the Red Sea four times the size of the 1989 Exxon Valdez incident in Prince William Sound, Alaska.
The UN says that flammable gasses continue to build up in the ship’s chambers and the ship’s structural integrity is deteriorating, making the need to take it off the water increasingly urgent. Houthis rebels have been blockading UN efforts to inspect and maintain the vessel since the war between the group and the internationally recognized Yemeni government began in 2014.
