KARACHI, Aug 19: Scientists having visited sea water surrounding the Tasman Spirit stated that oil spill continued on Tuesday.

A team of scientists from different government agencies and officials of the fisheries department and cooperative society had a cruise to collect water samples from off shore area to know the impacts of oil spill from the ship, which had run aground on July 27 and was broken in two pieces last Thursday.

According to the scientists, they went as close as 20 metres from the stranded ship and as far as six nautical miles from the ship in order to collect water samples from different stations and levels in the sea.

They said that the oil spill was still there, which could be attributed either to the poor sealing of valves and pipes or leakage taking places due to lighterage operations.

However, they pointed out that oil slick could not be seen after four to five nautical miles off shore.

In view of the prevailing wind direction, the fishing zone appeared to be safe now, but situation could turn unsafe in September, when the wind tide pattern used to change and oil slicks, if there existed any at that time drifted off shore, added one of the visiting scientists.

The cruise was arranged by the Karachi Fisheries and Harbour Department and Fishermen Cooperative Society for scientists belonging to the National Institute of Oceanography, Marine Biology Centre of the University of Karachi, Sindh Environmental Protection Agency.

“It was a five-hour journey, during which we have collected preliminary samples from four to five stations. We could have more samples, but we were short of equipment,” said Dr J A Siddiqui of the University of Karachi.

Another visitor said that fishing area was almost intact, while spill hazards were obvious at the Manora Channel’s mouth. Due to the use of dispersant, the oil layer in the water close to beach had started diminishing. However, they were not clear whether it would continue diminishing in future.

Director Fishermen Cooperative Society Ghulam Ali said that the scientists had collected samples separately for their own purpose and objective of research, while results would also be submitted to the government within one week.

The team comprised Dr Munawar Saleem, Dr Shaukat Hayat, Dr Makhdoom Ali, Dr Jamal A Siddiqui, S M Yahya, Abu Zar Mariwala, and Arshad Waheed of fisheries department.