Environment Southland, Divepro and insurance agents are urgently working on a plan to salvage a burnt-out boat in Milford Sound, which has created a minor oil spill in the harbour.

Divepro is a Dunedin-based salvage company.

Harbourmaster Lyndon Cleaver told the Southland App today the road and weather conditions meant that Monday was the first opportunity the team had had to assess the damage from the September 14 fire.

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The insurers had been willing to pay for flights to Milford during a small window of opportunity on Saturday, but helicopter operators had been busy transporting fisherman and fish quota, he said.

 “It [Monday] was the first opportunity for us to look at the site firsthand and assess the condition of the vessel and weigh up options to salvage it.

“They put a diver into the water to check the external structural integrity of the vessel and a diver inside the boat as well to have a look from the inside to see how the boat was holding up and what options that would give us for lifting the boat.’’

The team was now looking at the possibility of getting a sucker truck into Milford to suck up all the sludge and oil and lifting the boat using lifting bags.

Lifting options included extracting the partly submerged boat from its existing site at Fisherman’s Wharf, or moving it 100m to the Milford boat ramp before lifting it out of the water.

Mr Cleaver said Divepro was the project manager and that company was now preparing a salvage plan for the insurer, with the boat to be removed later this week, conditions permitting.

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The sludge and oil slick were not major and had been contained by booms.

“It is going to be a really difficult operation to salvage it and I think we are going to be a wee bit unrealistic to expect nothing to go into the marine environment. We don’t want that to happen, but it is going to be extremely difficult to remove a boat like this and keep everything contained in there. But I am sure we will do our best to try and get absolutely everything.”

Mr Cleaver recalled there had been much larger oil spill at Milford Sound many years ago, caused when a water hose was used to flush out a boat diesel tank.

However, that incident occurred before he was the harbourmaster and he understood that last week’s event was “very, very tame’’ in comparison to the past incident.

Milford Sound had been lucky that boat had not been operating for about eight years, was only used for accommodation and had “next to no fuel” in its tanks.

“If it had been a fishing boat it maybe would have one or two thousand litres of marine diesel and oil on board, it would have been a completely different scenario,” Mr Cleaver said.

The burned boat had next to no fuel in its tanks, harbourmaster Lyndon Cleaver said. PHOTO: Lyndon Cleaver/Environment Southland

The burned boat’s hull was Kevlar topped with fibreglass and not steel as earlier reported, he confirmed.

While the burned boat was not threatening navigational safety, it was now derelict and had to be removed before another bad weather front came through. 

Because Milford Sound was a significant tourism asset, it was important to do it right and not rush the job, Mr Cleaver said.

He had talked to the Department of Conservation to seek clearance for heavy machinery to go into Milford Sound by road.

Because the vehicles would be travelling through a national park, DOC required the machines to be cleaned to minimise the risk of transporting weeds and seeds into the area, he said.

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“[It will happen] over the next couple of days, I am hoping . . . There is quite a consideration for the dive team. Because not only do they have to refloat it and try and empty the water out of it and deconstruct the vessel and get it out of the water, their responsibility is also to get it out of the national park, using heavy lifters and heavy trailers.’’

Among the many other things to consider were the interests of iwi, and letting commercial and recreational boat users know the salvage operation was taking place.

If the preferred option was to use the Milford boat ramp to extract the boat, then people would unfortunately not be able to use the ramp while the salvage operation took place, Mr Cleaver said.