AGU charges BRL 322 million for aircraft carrier sunk by the Navy – 04/13/2023 – Environment

The AGU (Advocacy-General of the Union) filed a lawsuit in the Federal Court of Pernambuco to collect payment of R$ 322 million from the companies responsible for the hull of the aircraft carrier São Paulo, sunk by the Navy in February.

In the action, the government claims that compensation must be paid considering the environmental, operational and moral damage caused by the abandonment of the vessel in view of the imminence of its sinking due to the high level of degradation of the hull.

“The resulting [do abandono da embarcação] was tragic and harmful to the environment, and could be increasingly aggravated with the passage of time and with the consequent corrosion of its structures”, says the AGU in the action.

The amount of compensation was calculated on three fronts established by the AGU. Ibama (Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources) calculated at R$ 178 million the amount of economic compensation arising from the environmental damage caused by the sinking of the hull with toxic substances present on the aircraft carrier.

The calculation also considers BRL 37 million spent by the Navy, which was forced to regain control of the hull and perform its controlled sinking, and BRL 107.5 million for collective moral damage.

The target companies of the action are:

1. Sök Denizcilik and Ticaret Limited, which bought the aircraft carrier’s hull in 2020, and abandoned the vessel;
2. MSK Maritime Services & Trading LTD, responsible for transporting the vessel to Turkey;
3. Oceans Prime Offshore Agenciamento Marítimo LTDA, representative of Sök in Brazil and responsible for exporting the hull;
4. Thomas Miller Specialty, hired by Sök as the operation’s insurer.

“As this injurious result [afundamento do casco] was a direct result of an economic activity carried out by the defendant companies, which would profit from the purchase of the hull, which represented serious damage to the environment, it is necessary and inevitable that the Union and IBAMA act to hold the offenders responsible, demanding, including, civil reparation for the serious and irreversible damage caused to the environment”, says the AGU.

Such as Sheet showed, the wreck occurred on February 3, 350 kilometers off the coast of Pernambuco, in an area with a depth of 5,000 meters.

The vessel contains almost 10 tons of asbestos, and its sinking was the subject of discussions between ministers José Múcio Monteiro (Defense) and Marina Silva (Environment), who ended up defeated.

“The procedure was conducted with the necessary technical competence and safety by the Brazilian Navy, in order to avoid logistical, operational, environmental and economic damage to the Brazilian State”, said the Navy, in a note.

Military sources informed the Sheet that, after studies on buoyancy conditions, the Navy decided to sink the vessel in a controlled manner to prevent the hull from remaining on the verge of sinking, which could last until mid-February.

The technique used involved the action of divers, who placed explosives to make holes in the hull and increase the flow of water into the ship until it completely sank.

The sinking took place even after the business group Sela, from Saudi Arabia, had contacted the Brazilian Navy to present an offer to purchase the hull of the aircraft carrier São Paulo.

The Saudi group offered around BRL 30 million for the acquisition of the hull — an amount three times greater than that made by the Turkish shipyard Sök Denizcilik and Ticaret Limited.

The Turkish group acquired the vessel in 2020 from Engepron, a state-owned company linked to the Navy. At the end of last year, when the aircraft carrier was approaching the Strait of Gibraltar, on a trip made with the help of a tugboat, Turkey prohibited the hull from entering its territory.

The decision responded to complaints from organizations such as Greenpeace and the NGO Shipbreaking Platform, which were protesting against receiving the ship.

Analyzes carried out by the NGO Shipbreaking on a twin aircraft carrier to the São Paulo identified 760 tons of asbestos on the vessel. In view of this, the organization began to question whether, in fact, the hull sent by Brazil would have the 10 tons of toxic substance as foreseen in the inventory.

Since September, with the return of the aircraft carrier, several ports on the Brazilian coast have obtained judicial decisions to prevent the hull from being anchored in their vicinity.

The justification given was that the vessel has enormous dimensions and could make the port routine unfeasible. For more than four months, the hull was towed by Turkish ships looking for a destination, moving from the coast of Rio de Janeiro to Pernambuco, without success.

With no place to anchor and faced with problems with the vessel’s buoyancy conditions, the Navy moved the aircraft carrier away from the Brazilian coast — where submarine cables passed — and opted for controlled sinking.