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US-firm Resolve Marine Group has resumed work to remove almost one thousand tonnes of fuel oil from the sunken bulk carrier Black Rose off Paradip harbour in Orissa, Northeast India, after obtaining clearance to transport the retrieved fuel.

The Mongolia-flagged vessel capsized in the Bay of Bengal on September 9th approximately 5 kilometres off the Paradip coast, whilst carrying around 975 tonnes of fuel oil and 25,000 tonnes of iron ore fines.

Florida-based salvage firm Resolve Marine arrived at the port on October 18th and proceeded to carry out a preliminary survey.

On October 23rd, fuel oil from one of the storage tanks was retrieved. In total, 176 tonnes of fuel oil are reported to have been recovered from the ship so far.

However, oil salvage work was delayed on Friday when Customs authorities stopped Paradip Port Trust (PPT) from transporting the pumped oil citing lack of clearance. Salvage work then came to a grinding halt as Resolve Marine lacked suffificent oil storage.

Customs department sources are said to have claimed that PPT was asked to submit documents and deposit the Customs duty on October 14th, but failure to do so resulted in clearance not being obtained.

Salvage work resumed yesterday after PPT was given clearance to transport the pumped out oil via trucks.

The operation to remove all of the fuel on board the Black Rose is expected to take between three and four weeks.