NEW DELHI, May 26: Quickly responding to a call of request from the Sri Lankan navy, India dispatched various assets to extinguish a fire on the MV X Press Pearl off the coast of Colombo which had sparked a major ecological concern on Tuesday. This emergency came in the wake of an on-board on the Singapore-flagged MV X Press Pearl.
The Indian High Commission at Colombo in a tweet stated, “operation underway in full force! #ICGVajra also joined the combined operation along with #ICGVaibhav and Dornier aircraft which testifies to the comraderie between the Navies and Coast Guards of #India and #Sri Lanka”.
In a later tweet it stated “Close ties between #India and #Sri Lanka in the maritime sphere on display #MVXPressPearl operation continues. The flames have not tired out the fighters on #ICGVajra, #ICGVaibhav, #Dornier and other assets deployed by #lka who are valiantly battling it out.”
The MV X-Press Pearl, was enroute from Hazira to Colombo and was loaded with 1,486 containers, carrying around 25 tonnes of hazardous nitric acid and other chemicals. The vessel is holding about 325 metric tonnes of fuel in its tanks, the Indian High Commission in Colombo said.
Sri Lanka Navy requested assistance from the Government of India for fire-fighting and pollution control at 1200 hours on Tuesday. The request was immediately forwarded to the appropriate authorities in India, and assets were deployed immediately. While the Dornier aircraft reached Colombo about 1600 hrs, the first Vessel reached around1900 hrs.
The assets employed as an emergency method include the Indian Coast Guard’s Vessels Vaibhav, Vajra, and Samudra Prahari, as well as the Director General of Shipping’s Tug Water Lilly and Dornier aircraft for aerial surveillance..
The statement further said India has a long history of being the first responder in times of crisis in Sri Lanka. India also played a prominent role by deploying assistance during a massive oil spill after the MT New Diamond, carrying 200,000 metric tonnes of crude oil, caught fire off Sri Lanka’s Eastern Coast in September 2020.
(Venkatesh Iyer)
