On February 3, 2016, CSCL’s Indian Ocean grounded in the River Elbe, Germany.
Falling tides in the River Elbe, meant that the grounded vessel required salvage assistance to free her from the river bank. To enable the container vessel to pivot, prior to towing her back into the river, a significant volume of sand had to be removed. Dredging capacity was provided by Boskalis by way of two hopper dredgers, one backhoe dredger and a water injection dredger. For the refloat, significant pulling force was required. To this end, two large 200 TBP Anchor Handling Tugs from Boskalis Offshore were mobilized from Rotterdam, in addition to ten local harbor tugs. The Salvage Master had in excess of 1,000 TBP at his disposal to refloat the vessel. As a result, the vessel was safely refloated in line with the salvage plan and within the set time frame, with a minimum shut-off time for the river waterway.
