Special Correspondent

Panaji, Apr 19: River Princess, a huge oil tanker ship, which had ran aground on Goa beach almost 12 years ago, will finally be removed from the shore by next January.

State Tourism department has said that it will cost almost Rs 85 crore liability for the state to get the ship broken into pieces and carried away as a scrap. Goa has awarded the contract to `break and carry
away’ the ship to Mumbai based Arihant Ship Breakers company.

“The work on breaking the ship has already began as early as March 15. Almost 40 per cent of the top portion of the ship is dismantled and carried as a scrap,” state tourism director Swapnil Naik said.

He said that rest of the portion would be cut in phased manner and by January, next year, the ship will disappear from the shore.

Tourism department officials said that the biggest challenge for the company is to cut the portion of the ship, which is underwater.

“Cutting the body underwater might take little time and they will require special divers for that,” Naik said.

Somewhere in the year 2000, the ship had hit Sinquerim-Candolim shore due to rough weather. Several attempts to tow away the ship had failed, finally forcing the state government to allow its cutting.

After spending almost 12 years on the shore, the ship has gone 8 metres deep underwater in the sand. It has also wracked havoc on the beach resulting in severe erosion.

Government has already declared the vessel as a state disaster.

Naik said that the company has been given 180 days to remove the ship. “But they will have to stop the work during monsoons due to choppy season and extreme weather conditions on the beach,” he said.

The work will end on May 14 after monsoon sets in and will restart in September after the rains.