The owners of a foreign cargo vessel have agreed to pay 3.25 million dollars to the United States to settle charges that 15 containers lost overboard in 2004 resulted in damage to California's Monterey Bay, the Justice Department said Tuesday.
The settlement with owners of the Mad Taipei — All Oceans Transportation Inc., Italia Marritema SpA and Yang Ming Transport Corporation of Taiwan — represented the largest damages awarded to date regarding a national marine sanctuary, the Justice Department said.
In February 2004, 15 containers fell overboard from the vessel when it was traveling on rough seas from San Francisco to Los Angeles. They contained a variety of cargo, including thousands of tires and several hundred thousand plastic items.
A US Coast Guard report revealed the containers were inappropriately loaded on board the vessel.
"The funds provided as a result of today's settlement will be used to restore habitats within the national marine sanctuary, an area of high biological productivity and diversity," said Sue Ellen Wooldridge, Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division.
