Damaged Russian tanker carrying natural gas floats into Libyan waters | Libya
A seriously damaged Russian tanker carrying liquefied natural gas, adrift for two weeks in the Mediterranean, raising fears of an ecological disaster, has floated in Libyan waters, Italian civil protection announced Wednesday.
The Arctic Metagaz was part of a Russian “ghost fleet” used to circumvent sanctions imposed on the country’s oil and gas following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It was hit in a suspected drone attack near Maltese waters earlier this month, causing a huge hole. The crew was reportedly rescued between Malta and Libya.
Earlier this week, the tanker was adrift between Malta and the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, prompting the governments of Italy, France, Malta, Spain, Greece and Cyprus to write a joint letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen warning that the ship posed an “imminent and serious risk of major ecological disaster.”
A spokesperson for Italy’s civil protection agency, which is monitoring the situation, told the Guardian that the ship was now in Libyan territorial waters and therefore fell under the responsibility of the North African country’s authorities.
Libya on Wednesday issued a navigation notice to all vessels operating in the area – where sea conditions were currently rough – urging them to exercise extreme caution, according to reports in the Italian press.
The Italian civil protection spokesperson said that although no leak had been detected, the fundamental risk was the “dispersal into the sea of the hydrocarbons on board”.
They said: “There are about 90 tonnes of heavy fuel oil or diesel on board, so we are more sure of that risk. The other danger is related to the gas the tanker was carrying. We are less sure of the quantity, but there could be a dispersion of gas.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry acknowledged that the Arctic Metagaz, which was carrying LNG from the Arctic port of Murmansk, was adrift in the Mediterranean and said Moscow’s involvement in resolving the situation depended on “concrete circumstances.”
The Russian Transport Ministry said the ship was attacked by Ukrainian naval drones launched from the Libyan coast.
