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Fuel drums bob along in the wake of the raised fuel transport vessel

Sea Gypsies End Phuket Environmental Scare

Tuesday, September 14, 2010
PHUKET'S sea gypsies have brought up from the depths the diesel transporter that threatened to damage the island's marine environment.

It was all done with junk and rope. A dive to 43 metres . . . no problems for these sea gypsies . . . and with the help of some empty fuel drums filled with air, up bobbed the sunken Chotethaworn 6.

This afternoon, the hulk was towed into the deep sea port at Rassada on Phuket, where the sea gypsies busied themselves, raising the vessel still further out of the water.

The cargo of 25,000 litres of diesel will be pumped out soon, and the Phuket environmental scare will be over.

The Chotethaworn 6 went down in bad weather on September 4 while transporting its cargo to Racha Yai, home to the five-star Racha Resort.

The salvage operation, initially involving a flotilla of 10 vessels from Phuket, just in case there were fuel leaks, was delayed by more bad weather.

In the end it was Phuket's sea gypsies who did what most divers, even with the best of equipment, would have found a difficult task. Tomorrow they'll be back to their usual occupation as fishermen.

Comments

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Tomorrow I would check the recompression chambers at Vachira and Phuket Intl before stating they will be back to their usual occupation.

Posted by Vfaye on September 14, 2010 17:34

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True heroes! Thank you guys.. We should all be proud of you. Good job done!

Posted by Anonymous on September 14, 2010 17:56

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Well done, Moken! I have heard, however, that there has been a very high rate of decompression sickness among sea gypsy divers in recent years. Local authorities were at one point trying to educate the Moken divers on the dangers. Hope that these guys are all OK.

Posted by Treelover on September 14, 2010 18:38

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Credit where credit's due ...

Posted by Sean on September 14, 2010 19:15

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Well done!! Great!! True Heroes!!
Does this mean that the authorities failed again will all their modern equipment and our sea gypsies took over?

Posted by Mr. K on September 14, 2010 20:09

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This is good news. These guys have done a really great job. I hope they get a huge reward. Honor and respect this people, and also give them better rights!

Posted by PhuketExpat on September 15, 2010 10:18


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