Tragedy hits the Tamar

Twenty years ago one of Tasmania’s worst environmental disasters made global headlines

AS many as 30,000 little penguins may have died at sea after the bulk carrier Iron Baron piled onto a reef and spewed out oil near the entrance of the Tamar River, 20 years ago almost to the day.

Nick Mooney, a former Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment wildlife biologist who helped to clean up what is remembered as one of Tasmania’s most publicised environmental disasters, described it as horrible and expensive.

Mr Mooney said mistakes had been made — understandable given people on the ground had no experience with oil spills — but a few tremendous strokes of luck had prevented it from becom- ing a greater catastrophe. For starters, it was fortunate for the region’s short-tailed shearwaters that they had all flown off to the northern hemisphere on their annual migration.

Had the Iron Baron run on to Hebe Reef, about 5km from the mouth of the Tamar River, during summer, the oil would have wiped them out.

And had the oil washed up on a lonely shore with no roads, electricity and a caring community nearby, the task of rescuing and cleaning about 2000 penguins, then keeping them out of harm’s way, might not have been accomplished in time, he said.

Mr Mooney said the scene at Low Head, which received worldwide attention, had been reminiscent of the opening scenes of the TV series

MASH, with the incoming helicopters laden with wounded penguins.

“Only about five or six of those birds died. They are such tough birds,’’ he said.

Cormorants were not so lucky and the seals were “too big and boisterous” to receive help.

But pelicans were able to be caught and held until the danger had passed.

Mr Mooney said it was also fortunate that the Iron Baron was operated by BHP — an Australian company — which cared about its image to the extent that it forked out millions of dollars without complaint to pay for the clean-up, sparing the State Government from protracted wrangling with insurance companies.

According to the Australian Maritime Safety Authority report, the Iron Baron, bound for Bell Bay, was in serious trouble at 7.33pm on July 10, 1995 as the pilot was climbing aboard from his launch to guide manoeuvres.

The fully-loaded bulk carrier was closer to the Hebe Reef beacon than the master would have liked and the helm was hard-a-port in an effort to avoid the reef. But due to wind and tides, the ship was refusing to turn.

Less than five minutes later the crew felt a grating sensation and heard a rumbling noise as the ship grounded on the reef, lurking just below the surface at high tide.

Soon after midnight the tide had ebbed, the wind and sea conditions had increased and “personnel were being thrown across the wheelhouse and engine control room’’ while waves were breaking over the ship’s side.

The last 12 crew members had been taken off Iron Baron by the pilot launch by 7.20 in what former Launceston harbourmaster Charles Black described as a heroic

rescue. Mr Black said around that time he had experienced his own moment of terror, while standing alone in the Port of Launceston boardroom.

“I knew that hell was coming . . . only I didn’t know how much and I was to be the incident controller,’’ he said.

Mr Black, who retired from TasPorts just last week, said during the night “a significant escape of oil” had been observed.

But the enormity of the problem hadn’t become clear until daylight.

Put simply, large areas of coastline were coated in oil.

He said the ship discharged another large glob of oil during efforts to haul it off the reef using tugs. Booms had to be deployed in a desperate effort to stop the oil’s westward drift toward Port Sorell.

In the two decades since, Mr Mooney said bird populations had bounced back in what appeared to be a full recovery.

Shirley Lincoln, operator of Low Head Penguin Tours, who had taken part in the bird rescue effort, said the penguin colony was going ahead in “leaps and bounds”.

She said no one would know if the disaster was continuing to have a residual effect, “because no one is counting”.

BirdLife Tasmania convener Eric Woehler said longterm surveys were needed to guide management decisions for dealing with future disasters, but were not being done, as the government palmed off responsibility to councils, PhD students and volunteers.

After it was refused entry to Bell Bay, the freed Iron Baron, still holding an estimated 70 tonnes of the 543 tonnes of heavy fuel oil it had been carrying, was towed northeast of Flinders Island and sunk in 4000m of water on July 30, 1995.

Mr Mooney said if Tasmania were to suffer another major oil spill, there would be a much more effective response from better trained and better equipped personnel.

“It’s definitely one of those cases where prevention is much better than a cure,’’ he said.