SS Princess Kathleen; Juneau, Alaska

Juneau, Alaska | 2010-Feb-22

Initial Notification: The SS Princess kathleen is a well-known wreck in the Juneau area, which sunk on Sept. 7, 1952. The Princess Kathleen ran aground on Pt Lena just outside Juneau and then sank just off the point with an unknown quantity of Fuel oil in her tanks. From a time shortly after her sinking to today, she has been leaking fuel oil into the surrounding waters. Recent increases in the sightings of small oil blobs in the area of Lena Pt. resulted in Sector Juneau's decision to seriously evaluate the wreck for possible removal of the remaining fuel, which is very roughly estimated at 155,000 gallons of bunker C. On Feb. 16, 2010, Global Offshore Divers of Anchorage mobilized a three-man remote operated vehicle crew to Juneau in response to a request by the USCG, Sector Juneau's Incident management, to survey the wreck of this vessel. The survey lasted a total of three days from Feb. 17-19 with two ROV's, and the first entry in this Hotline is the Global Diving report from those surveys. After mobilization of equipment from Seattle, Global Diving tentatively hopes to start pumping oil on or about March 5. NOAA has been asked to provide weather and trajectory support for this incident. All operations progressed methodically, and hence most of the fuel was successfully removed.