FUCKY
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-28/ship-owner-in-baltimore-bridge-tragedy-vessel-banned-australia/103642216
27-Mar-2024
Tax havens and worker exploitation: Baltimore bridge disaster gives glimpse into 'murky world' of shipping
In short: A shipping company at the centre of the Baltimore disaster had another vessel banned from Australian ports in 2021 for worker exploitation.
The Australian Maritime Safety Regulator found the ship's operator had unlawfully underpaid workers and kept them on board too long.
The Dali is owned by a company in secretive tax haven, the British Virgin Islands.
The owners of the ship at the centre of the Baltimore bridge disaster in the US had another vessel banned from Australian ports over unlawful exploitation of workers.
The Dali, a 300-metre container ship which accidentally destroyed a bridge, causing the presumed deaths of six people and blocking a major US trade route, is owned via a secretive tax haven company in the British Virgin Islands called Grace Ocean Investment Limited.
Another ship that belonged to the company was slapped with a six-month ban in 2021 for what the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said were "serious and shameful breaches" of maritime labour laws.
The operator of the Western Callao was forced to hand over about $40,000 in unpaid wages to 13 seafarers.
AMSA detained the same ship at Port Kembla in New South Wales in July 2020, finding the operator had unlawfully kept eight seafarers on board for more than 11 months.
Another of the company's ships, the Furness Southern Cross, had also unlawfully kept 10 seafarers on board for more than 14 months.
Days after its ban from Australian ports, the Western Callao was sold off by its owner.
The Dali is run by a different operator but owned via the same tax haven company.
The international union representing seafarers says the case of the Dali offers a glimpse into the "murky world" of global shipping where big players use tax havens and "flags of convenience" to evade regulatory scrutiny.
The collision in Baltimore on Tuesday, which triggered the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, was the Dali's second major accident in nine years at sea.
Built in 2015 and originally registered in the Marshall Islands, the Dali was at the Port of Antwerp-Bruges in Belgium a year later when it ran into a steel quay.
The ship, which suffered hull damage and was held for repairs to make it seaworthy, had a different owner and operator at the time.
The Dali is now registered in Singapore, where it's owned by a subsidiary of the BVI-registered Ocean Grace.
The Singapore subsidiary owns 55 ships in total, according to online shipping database Equasis.
Corporate records show the subsidiary has three directors based in Singapore: Tock Hin Anthony Heng, a Singapore national; Oliver Pabalan Espino, a Filipino national; and Yoshimasa Abe, a Japanese national.
It was Mr Abe who signed an agreement in July 2020 for the company with a Singapore union guaranteeing conditions for maritime employees on ships including the Dali.
It also included the Western Callao, which was banned from Australia the following year for underpaying seafarers.
The ABC called Mr Abe and emailed questions but he did not respond. His co-directors could not be reached.
Grace Ocean, which bought the Dali months after its Belgian accident in 2016, uses another Singapore company, Synergy Group, to operate the ship.
In a statement, Synergy said the Dali had collided with a pillar of the bridge at Baltimore "whilst under pilotage with two pilots onboard", referring to local mariners responsible for boarding and guiding the ship safely out of the harbour.
Synergy said the "exact cause of the incident was yet to be determined [and] the owners and managers are fully cooperating with Federal and State government agencies".
The ship was bound for the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, where it was due to arrive on April 22.
It had spent three days in dock at Baltimore, having arrived via Norfolk and New York after travelling through the Panama Canal earlier this month.
The ship's last recorded inspection by authorities was by the US Coast Guard in New York last September, according to Equasis.
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