The wreck of the Eleni V

August 02, 2004

Yarmouth’s golden beaches turned an evil-smelling black as seabirds drowned in a sticky mousse that covered the surface of the sea. The spewing of tons of oil from the stricken tanker Eleni V came at the very start of the holiday season, and yet it brought out an almost wartime spirit among the council workers and volunteers involved in the clean-up. Stephen Pullinger reports.

Wrecked: looking more like a beached whale, the Eleni V sits with HMS Plymouth close by, as the ship's helicopter ferries explosives across to the tankers hull.

It was as long ago as 1989 that Ernest Halliwell departed from his office at Yarmouth Town Hall. But 15 years of happy, golfing retirement at his home on Gorleston cliffs have done nothing to fade memories of the 10-day drama that unfolded when the Greek tanker Eleni V was cut in two in a collision with the French merchant vessel Roseline six miles off Winterton.

As Yarmouth Borough Council’s director of technical services, Mr Halliwell, now 75, was in charge of the mammoth operation to clean up beaches from Winterton to Hopton.

And as pressure mounted from frantic tourist leaders, he even found time out of his 16-hour days to lead a delegation to Westminster to demand help from govern-ment ministers.

Mr Halliwell recalls that he was none too pleased to receive a call telling him of the collision at around lunchtime on “Cup Final Saturday” in 1978.
Sailing from Rotterdam to Grangemouth, the Eleni V, carrying 16,000 tons of oil, had been rammed in thick fog.

The 39 crew miraculously escaped unhurt, but the bow section of the tanker was left to drift in the North Sea, “like a rogue elephant on the loose”, in the memorable words of Anthony Fell, Yarmouth’s Conservative MP at the time.

Mr Halliwell said: “I went up to Winterton and California on the Saturday to see if there were any signs of oil, but nothing was happening at that time.
“It was on the Sunday that oil started to come ashore south of Winterton, and that was the start of our 16-hour days with the majority of the council workforce roped into the operation as well as quite a lot of volunteers.”

Norfolk County Council was responsible for dealing with the oil at sea, but Mr Halliwell recalled that attempts to spray it from boats with chemicals designed to disperse it seemed to transform it into a “thick chocolate mousse”.

By midday on the Sunday, eight spraying vessels were in operation off Yarmouth with a Naval vessel acting as on-scene commander.

Even the 40-mile gas pipeline from the Leman B field to the Bacton terminal was affected, having to close down for fear that it had been damaged by the Eleni V’s floating hull, a possibility that would have escalated the crisis.

Big Bang: The destruction of the Eleni V, May 1978

EDP reporters monitored the operation from a chartered fishing boat and a helicopter and highlighted the heartbreaking effect on wildlife.

“Even the seals of Scroby Sands could find no escape from the black menace which was lapping on to the sandbank,” stated one report.

“Pups and adult seals clustered together in the middle of the sandbank, trying to avoid the thick sludge only a few yards away.”

From their RAF Puma helicopter, the EDP team reported seeing “a carpet of oil stretching unbroken for nearly a mile at Hopton, turning the yellow sand black overnight”.
At neighbouring Corton, the EDP reported “the waves surged on to the beach with a horrible hiss. Wall after wall of thick black sludge pushed relentlessly up the beach”.

The heavy fumes had an EDP reporter and photographer feeling giddy and suffering from sore, dry throats and headaches within 20 min- utes.
Mr Halliwell recalled: “We began by shovelling the oil up and taking it away in lorries. A lot was deposited at Cobholm.

“Then it started to beat us, and we had to get highways scrapers in to dig trenches on the beaches and bury it. The idea was that because oil is bio-degradable it would disappear over time.

“The oil that came ashore was really black and covered the beach quite liberally, and it did not smell good.”

The EDP reported at the time that the cost of clearing oil from Yarmouth borough’s beaches started at £1000 a day, but soon jumped to £2500 as more machinery, vehicles and men were brought in.

An attempt to stop oil advancing up the river with a plastic boom near Haven Bridge failed, and Anglian Water Authority officials reported broken patches of oil as far as Breydon Water.

Mr Halliwell recalled that the holiday camps were “very anxious indeed, and vied with one another as to where we should attack the problem first”.

He said: “Part of the upturned hull was floating up and down the North Sea so we had to follow it during the clean-up operation.
“For the first few days we kept pace, but once we got deposit on deposit, it became harder.”

Various chemical solutions were offered but nothing seemed to work other than the old-fashioned shovel.

Mr Halliwell’s junior colleague at the time, John Hemsworth, now head of environmental health, recalled that he learned of the disaster when he heard the maroon go at Caister lifeboat station while he was walking his dog.

His abiding memory once the oil came ashore was “the awful stench that made you feel sick”.

“It became a tourist attraction in itself with lots of people coming to Yarmouth to see it,” he said.

Mr Hemsworth remembered the awful toll on seabirds that made the oil spill at Yarmouth that he handled, two years ago, pale into insignificance.

Mr Halliwell recalled: “There was a lot of debate in Parliament about what to do with the hull, and we took a delegation from Yarmouth down to the House of Commons. We were all tired after 10 days, and our cry was, ‘Blow it up’.”

The EDP reported Yarmouth MP Mr Fell calling in Parliament for a revision to government plans for dealing with wrecks around the UK shore.
He said key personnel should be dispatched to the area to make decisions on the spot, and if a decision had been taken straight away the weather would still have been moderate enough to deal with the wreck.

In Charge: Ernest Halliwell was yarmouth Borough Council's director of technical services.

Mr Fell said it was “ludicrous” that the UK had no control over foreign ships that collided in our territorial waters, and that the inquiry was being left to the French and Greek authorities.

Mr Halliwell also recalled a major meeting in East Anglia to discuss the problem involving regional local authorities’ representatives and Ministry of Environment officials.

“The big worry was how much oil remained in the hull. Was it best to let it seep out or get rid of it in one big bang,” he said.

Finally the decision was taken to blow it up, and Mr Halliwell recalled how that signalled the end of the pollution problem.

Fears of a black Whitsun for Yarmouth tourist industries were averted, and to this day Mr Halliwell remains pleased how his staff rallied round during one of the most difficult times in his 23 years on the council.
But while the oil disappeared mercifully quickly, it remained a difficult holiday season for some businesses.

Mr Halliwell said: “I don’t think holiday camps were greatly affected by the oil, but I do know they were reporting people cancelling holidays once news of the Eleni V had spread.”