By Jenny Suo
It has been slow but progress has been made.
Salvors have managed to pump 70 tonnes of oil out of the Rena since operations began last night.
They say they are going as fast as they can but bad weather tonight is threatening to halt operations and the ship itself.
The dark clouds forming this evening could signal the beginning of a tough night for Rena's salvage operators.
Three crew members are onboard the Rena, and they are hoping they can stay onboard to continue pumping oil overnight but that of course depends on the weather.
It has already been raining in Tauranga tonight and a swell is expected to reach up to two and a half metres with the 30 knot winds hitting tonight.
So salvors will no doubt be crossing their fingers and hoping they are not too badly effected by the change in the weather, so that they can keep pumping that oil off the vessel.
But a break in the weather during the day offered a chance to work on the broken ship.
Rena is so damaged many are surprised it is not at the bottom of the sea. Containers sit at impossible angles, the split hull protests as it hangs off the reef.
Those that have been onboard say Rena is barely holding on.
“Oh it was hairy. You know this thing is groaning and creaking and making huge noises, it's a vessel dying,” says Maritime New Zealand salvage unit head, Bruce Anderson.
Below deck the salvors are working every hour they can, getting the oil transferred to the waiting Awanuia.
The oil has to be pumped down a 160 metre hose, which is just seven and a bit centimetres thick.
A booster pump is likely to be used overnight to speed up the process.
What is known as an Archimedes screw pump is inside the main and being used to force the oil through.
The pump is basically a spiral screw inside an open ended cylinder. When the screw turns, oil lifts through the grooves between the spiral and the cylinder walls.
But with bad weather approaching, whether the crew can stay onboard to work the equipment overnight is still unknown.
“There are always risks but as a professional salvage company we have to manage those risks. We have to monitor safety, our personal safety for our crew are priority number one followed by minimising pollution to the environment,” says Salvage project leader Drew Shannon.
If the ship breaks in two, it is hoped the back half floats long enough for it to be towed to shallow water.
It is holding together for the moment and there have not been any more leaks.
“We're at the 90 percent mark in terms of oil clean up. What we've got now are mainly the rocky out crops to work through and clean up,” says Maritime New Zealand on-shore coordinator, Nick Quinn.
But with strong winds and swells, authorities are certain more containers will fall and more oil will escape.
The weather window is closing and no one knows if Rena will be intact, when it opens again.
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