Maersk shipping line denies accusations it deliberately turned off navigation devices and endangered workers lives
Maersk shipping line has denied accusations it deliberately turned off navigation devices and endangered workers lives.
Claims shipping line Maersk stopped Automatic Identification Systems to avoid strikers last week are “imaginative’ and “unfounded”, Maersk New Zealand Managing Director Julian Bevis says.
“Quite apart from the fact that it is imaginative that one could somehow smuggle a ship in, it’s just not something Maersk Line does,” Bevis says.
Bevis says regulatory body Maritime New Zealand informed Maersk there had been an anonymous complaint on March 2 that the AIS had been switched off on the Irene’s Remedy and Maersk Aberdeen as they approached New Zealand.
“We said to them, after checking with both masters, that this was not correct,” he says.
“And that was confirmed by Maritime NZ.”
“The welfare of our crew is paramount. This is simply not the way we behave.”
A release published today on the Maritime Union of New Zealand website says the union was not satisfied with the response from Maersk, and will be placing a complaint with Maritime NZ.
Maritime Union General Secretary Joe Fleetwood says the maritime worker who noticed the anomaly said the vessels were trying to be “silent” to prevent tracking due to the current industrial dispute.
Fleetwood says Maritime NZ’s response on March 2 was:
“Subsequent to your query regarding the captioned matter, we have raised concern to the operator of both vessels. The operator confirms that the AIS system on both vessels is in good working order. The masters are now aware of this issue and have put the AIS system back into service.”
Fleetwood
says Maritime NZ’s response to the worker makes it clear that the AIS systems were in good working order, and had to be put ‘back into service’.
He says Maersk also confirmed yesterday that their AIS navigation systems were fully functional.
“Given this – for their ships not to turn up for several hours in the AIS navigational tracking – says to us that they were deliberately turned off,” Fleetwood says.
“We await a response from Maersk that properly accounts for these discrepancies.”
“In the meantime, it is our view that Maritime New Zealand needs to commence a detailed investigation to get to the bottom of this.”
The union has compared the possible consequences of the alleged incident to the Rena disaster, which ran aground near Tauranga, New Zealand, resulting in a major oil spill.
Joe Fleetwood says if Maersk’s navigation devices were switched off deliberately, it showed a complete disregard for the safe passage of the ships and their workforce.