Remains of destroyed yacht towed to Bijelo, dry-docking or cutting prohibited until authorities issue a statement

The firefighting operation on the luxury motor yacht "Ramonda", which, under still officially undetermined circumstances, caught fire on Thursday at around 18 pm in the Portonovi marina in Kumbor, ended late last night when the remains of the destroyed "Ramonda" were towed from Kumbor to the Adriatic 42 shipyard in Bijela.

The yacht wreck there is secured along the operational shore and surrounded by a floating dam that is intended to prevent the spread of any possible spills of oil, petroleum, and other harmful substances from what remains of the hull of the 30-meter-long and seven-meter-wide fiberglass yacht to the surrounding waters.

As "Vijesti" has learned, the navigation safety inspector Captain Grujica Dudić today issued a decision prohibiting any attempt to remove the wreck of the "Ramonde" to dry land or cut it up, until the Maritime Safety and Port Management Administration (UPSUL), the Kotor Harbour Master's Office and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs have issued a statement on the matter in accordance with the jurisdiction of these bodies.

The reason for this is primarily the fact that the wreck of the "Ramonde" in its current state represents an environmental hazard, as there are still about 8.000 liters of diesel fuel in the tanks of the destroyed yacht and a significant amount of oil in the ship's engines.

Given that the structural integrity of the rest of the hull of the "Ramonde" has been greatly damaged and weakened by the destruction by fire, any attempt to remove the ship to shore using the travel lift at the Adriatic 42 shipyard could literally disintegrate the wreck, leading to fuel and oil spills and an ecological disaster.

Therefore, the Navigation Safety Inspectorate requests that all necessary measures be taken beforehand to pump out the fuel from the wreck, that is, that UPSUL, the Port Authority and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs adopt adequate solutions within their jurisdiction on how to further deal with the remains of the luxury yacht, which, until a few days ago, was worth around 10 million euros.

The yacht, registered under the flag of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and with a port of registration in Kingstown, is owned by the company "Millennium Team" doo from Belgrade, and was only two years old.

The police are investigating the causes of the fire on a yacht moored in the elite Portonovi marina, and the actions of its crew are also under scrutiny, because there were no crew members on board at the time the fire broke out.

On the other hand, the action of extinguishing the fire and attempting to rescue the burning yacht itself showed a series of shortcomings and poor coordination between parts of the national chain for interventions in cases of emergencies at sea - starting from the untimely notification of UPSUL, through the failure to appear on site while the yacht was being rescued by the director of that Administration and the port captain in Kotor, the lack of a clear and unambiguous chain of command for the action of rescuing endangered property at sea by the commander on site, the lukewarm and inadequate reaction of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs, the absence of any reaction and action by the National Committee for Search and Rescue at Sea, to the transfer of the greatest burden of the extinguishing action and responsibility for it to the Herceg Novi Municipal Protection and Rescue Service, which is neither adequately equipped nor trained for such complicated interventions of extinguishing fires on ships.

This incident has shown in practice that, despite the claims of the authorities from the Ministry of Maritime Affairs, Montenegro is still far behind the standards and efficiency of the system of true maritime states in effectively responding to and dealing with the consequences of even the most serious emergencies at sea.