Summary
The German Bight shipping lane is a vital maritime corridor located in the southeastern part of the North Sea, off the coast of Germany and Netherlands. It serves as a gateway for European trade, facilitating the movement of goods through major ports including Hamburg and Bremerhaven. The area also holds immense environmental significance, as the Wadden Sea to the south is a designated marine protected area and a UNESCO World Heritage site.
On July 25th, 2023, the Car Carrier “Freemantle Highway” departed from Bremerhaven, Germany, bound for Port Said, Egypt, carrying 3,783 cars including 483 electric vehicles (EVs), as per a statement from the operator Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha Ltd.
Skytek maps in Figure 1 an overview of the area and the AIS track of Fremantle Highway from Bremerhaven departure.
A fire broke out near the EV bay area later that day, leading to the loss of a crewmember’s life and the rest of the crew abandoning of the ship. The cause of the fire remains unknown, and investigations are underway by the Netherlands Coastguard and Panama, the flag state of registry. The presence of EVs complicates firefighting efforts due to the release of oxygen from burning electric batteries, increasing the risk of reigniting the fire.
The Dutch water board, Rijkswaterstaat (RWS), is coordinating the salvage operation, deploying several salvage tugs and pollution control vessels at the scene to extinguish the fire while ensuring the vessel’s stability and attaching a tug line to prepare for towing the ship away from the environmentally sensitive area.
On July 27th, 2023, Skytek used Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) signals overlayed with Automated Identification System (AIS) signals, creating an overview of the firefighting scene shown in Figure 2 below. Although the Fremantle Highway stopped transmitting AIS signals since July 26th, it remains clearly visible in the SAR imagery captured by the Sentinel 1 Hub satellite.
On July 28th , RWS provided an update stating that the fire on the vessel is still ongoing, with smoke still being emitted. However, measured temperatures on the ship had started to decrease, and the salvage crew managed to secure a tow line to the Anchor Handling Tug Supply (AHTS) Fairplay-30. Due to weather conditions, the towing operation could not begin over the weekend, but Skytek monitoring the scene notes that the AHTS Fairplay-30 accompangned by four other tugs from the appointed the salvors Smit and Multraship are towing the Fremantle Highway towards the island of Schiermonninkoog, Netherlands
ABOUT THE " FREEMANTLE HIGHWAY” - IMO 9667344
The “Fremantle Highway” – IMO: 9667344 is an 18,549 DWT Vehicles Carrier built in 2013, registered with the Panama Flag and classed by Nippon Kaiji Kyokai (NK). The vessel is owned by Luster Maritime Higaki Sangyo and group owned by Shoei Kisen Kk and operated by Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha Ltd, while its insurance is provided by Japan P&I Club.
Notably, the Fremantle Highway shares the same Flag, Group and Registered Owner as the ill-fated Ever Given, which blocked the Suez Canal for a week in March 2021.
