How a skeleton crew stopped an oil disaster


Reporters approach the the UN-owned Nautica vessel moored off the coast of Yemen's contested western port of Hodeida, on July 17, 2023. The United Nations on July 17 handed over a vessel that will take on board oil from a decaying tanker in the Red Sea off war-torn Yemen, an operation aimed at averting an environmental catastrophe. (Photo by MOHAMMED HUWAIS / AFP)

WHEN an alarm sounded on the decaying oil tanker off Yemen’s coast, signalling a leak in its engine room, Hussein Nasser quickly sprang into action.

Working around the clock for days, he and the half dozen other people on board the FSO Safer fashioned makeshift iron strips to patch a burst pipe, before divers arrived to install a permanent steel plate to keep seawater from sinking the ship.

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