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In a what seems like a test of the capacity of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency(NIMASA) Deep Blue Assets, a Floating Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel, named Trinity Spirit, exploded yesterday within the Nigeria’s territorial waters, generating fear in its raging fire and thick smoke.
A reliable source hinted MMS Plus that the incident has so far claimed three lives as seven crew members are still missing in the smouldering fire that even defied the belated unprofessional rescue efforts by an unknown group of jesters occupying a rescue facility sited in a viral video.
Sources confirmed that the vessel bearing and produces oil is located around the Escravos area of Warri South-West Local Government Area of Delta State. The facility is allegedly owned by a multi-national oil and gas company which has a North Field Oil Facility around Meren in Escravos.
The incident was said to have taken place around 1am on Wednesday when a loud explosion was heard, causing serious fear among workers manning oil facilities within the vicinity as they watch the raging fire helplessly till afternoon when the information filtered in.
Sources, however, claimed that the NIMASA rescue team was apprised of the development but there was no record that intervention came.
Surprisingly, some people took to social media to claim that Trinity Spirit FPSO had long been decommissioned. “ Decommissioned is an understatement, the last time I visited this unit, the crew were fetching water for flushing the lavatory from the sea directly with buckets. She is long gone”, another commentator retorted.
However, observers in the shipping industry believe that this is a discredit to Nigeria as a maritime country that aspires every two years to be in the comity of nations that decides the fate of international shipping.
Some experts have argued that there should have been concerted efforts at salvaging the vessel in flame if not for any other reason, at least, the lives of the occupants and the environmental hazards and its import on the bio-ecosystem.
This incident has further raised questions on the relevance of the Deep Blue Assets said to have been deployed within the nation’s territorial waters, observers stated.
