AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A Greek tanker with jet fuel and a Cypriot container ship collided some 30 km off the Dutch coast at Scheveningen, the Dutch coast guard said on Tuesday.
Peter van Oorschot, a spokesman for the Dutch Coast Guard, told Reuters the tanker Mindoro had been leaking highly inflammable jet fuel from a hole above the water line.
"The leakage has now stopped, they have pumped the fuel from a leaking compartment to another tank on board. What is left is a stream of fuel on the water and there is danger of explosion," Van Oorschot said. Oil is floating on the water over an area of 3 km to 0.5 km but an oil dispersion vessel at the scene said it was not needed to clean the oil as it would evaporate.
Van Oorschot could not say how much jet fuel the tanker was carrying or how much was lost. He said the weather had been clear, the wind modest and waves were some one metre.
The Cypriot container ship Jork Ranger has a crew of 12 and has asked permission to sail for Rotterdam. The tanker had been heading for anchorage off Scheveningen.
A Port of Rotterdam spokesman said the container ship had been en route to Rotterdam from St Petersburg.
According to the digital-seas website the Mindoro has a width of 42 metres and a length of 244 metres.
Marinetraffic.com says the Jork Ranger has a length of 141 metres and a width of 22 metres and had last been berthed at Sodertalje, near Stockholm.
(Reporting by Marcel Michelson and Aaron Gray-Block; editing by James Jukwey)
