Cosco Busan operator guilty, to pay $10 million
Bob Egelko
San Francisco Chronicle
08/14/2009
The company operating the container ship that
struck the Bay Bridge in November 2007 and spilled more than 53,000
gallons of oil into the bay pleaded guilty Thursday to charges of water
pollution and falsifying documents and agreed to pay $10 million in
fines and penalties.
Fleet Management Ltd. of Hong Kong admitted two felony charges and a
misdemeanor in U.S. District Court in San Francisco after negotiating
its fine with federal prosecutors. Judge Susan Illston, who can accept
or reject the agreement, scheduled sentencing for Dec. 11.
The ship's pilot, Capt. John Cota, was sentenced to 10 months in
prison last month after pleading guilty to misdemeanor charges of
polluting the waters and killing migratory birds.
Cota was navigating the 901-foot Cosco Busan when it hit a tower of the bridge in thick morning fog Nov. 7, 2007.
Oil that poured from the ship spread along 26 miles of shoreline and
killed more than 2,400 birds. The government estimates the cleanup cost
at $70 million.
In its guilty plea, Fleet Management admitted that it was partly to
blame for the accident because it failed to provide adequate training
to the ship's new captain and crew, who allowed Cota, the locally
assigned pilot, to leave port in the fog and did not monitor his
navigation.
When Cota asked about two red triangles that showed up on the ship's
electronic chart, the captain told him they represented lights on the
bridge, and Cota headed the vessel in that direction at full speed,
according to court documents acknowledged by Fleet Management.
In fact, the documents said, the lights represented buoys that were
supposed to warn ships away from the bridge tower. The Cosco Busan hit
the bridge several minutes later.
Fleet Management also admitted presenting false and forged documents
to the Coast Guard about the ship's voyage plan in order to obstruct
the government's investigation.
