the Singapore Shipping Association asks that the fires in the forests of Sumatra are stopped



The Singapore Shipping Association (SSA) has turned an appeal to the Indonesian government so that the fires in the forests of the island of Sumatra are stopped, hung in order to gain superficial coltivabili. The roghi, in fact, they produce a smoke cloud that covers the region, included the Strait of Malacca, southern Malaysia and Singapore, and that it puts to risk safety of navigation in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore.

The association has remembered that these straits constitute one unwind strategic of the world-wide commerce and one of the water ways more sold of the world. Every day beyond 140 ships, between which great oil tankers, portacontainer, portarinfuse and cruise ships, let alone a series of other smaller boats, crosses the straits.

SSA has manifested seriates worry for the effects of the worsening of the visibility conditions on safety of navigation. If the commanders of the ships adequately are prepared in order to navigate in very foggy climates and stormy in other seas open - it has explained the association - the transit through the Tightened straits and sold of Malacca and Singapore can turn out however very challenging and dangerous, especially in the presence of a dense smoke.

"The Straits of Malacca and Singapore - Daniel Tan has declared, executive director of SSA - are between narrow the routes of navigation more sold and of the world. A visibility reduced on a marine route so sold can sure have an impact on safety of navigation in the Straits. The passage through the Straits is returned complicated by the numerous small commercial boats and also from the fleeting ships ulteriorly employees in order to cross them". "If of ill-fated incident - it has emphasized Tan - human lives and the marine atmosphere would be put to risk, above all if this had to involve a VLCC fully loaded. The spillage of oil from the oil tanker could not only have serious consequences on the marine life in the Straits, but also to affect the life of the fishermen and of which they depend on the tourist field".

Beyond it has to express worry for the effect that the smoke has on the atmospheric pollution and the climatic change, SSA has evidenced that a serious problem is constituted also by the inhalation of marine thin powders of the smoke by the boarded ones on the ships.

The association has concluded exhorting the commanders of all the ships in transit in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore to take the measures necessary in order to guarantee a sure navigation and has, in particular, advised to proceed to safety speed and to employ ulterior lookout-posts instead being based exclusively on the navigation instruments electronic in order to characterize small ships nearby.