Ship on fire, page-2

The only recent fire was the one Rio Tinto had 2 weeks ago !!!!!!

Fire hits Rio Tinto’s Western Australian iron ore port.
8 March 2021

A fire at UK-Australian mining firm Rio Tinto's East Intercourse Island (EII) iron ore berth at Dampier port on the Pilbara coast of Western Australia (WA) has disrupted shipments from the port.

The fire broke out in the screening house for the berth on the evening of 5 March and was quickly bought under control, according to Rio Tinto.

The EII berth was empty on 8 March, with a vessel moved from here to Rio Tinto's adjacent Parker Point berth 3 on 7 March.

Another vessel is due to arrive at the EII berth at 5pm Western Australian standard time (9am GMT) on 8 March.

Rio Tinto declined to comment on the impact of this latest fire on its ability to ship iron ore. This is the third time that the firm's WA iron ore exports have been disrupted by fires in just over two years.

Its EII facility caught fire in April 2019 and a screen house at its Cape Lambert port suffered a major fire in January 2019.

Rio Tinto has sole use of Dampier, which contains the 45mn t/yr EII berth and 110mn t/yr Parker Point berths, and the 205mn t/yr Cape Lambert ports for iron ore loading. Other Pilbara iron ore producers share the multi-user facilities at Port Hedland.

All the producers are pushing exports at a high rate to capitalise on strong iron ore prices. Argus last assessed the ICX iron ore price at $174.40/t cfr Qingdao on a 62pc Fe basis on 5 March, down slightly from a six-year high of $179.40 on 4 March but up from $126.65/t on 23 November and $89.35/t a year earlier.

Rio Tinto expects to ship 325mn-340mn t of iron ore in 2021, having shipped 330.6mn t in 2020.