Greece-based tanker operator Aegean Shipping Management, S.A., will pay a penalty of US$2 million after pleading guilty to violating the US Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships (APPS) and obstruction of justice related to the illegal discharges of oily bilge waste from the chemical tanker T/V Green Sky in 2015.
Aegean will also be sentenced to probation and an environmental compliance plan and agreed to a community service component directed toward the Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary at a federal court in Charleston, South Carolina.
It pleaded guilty in November 2016 to one APPS count for the illegal discharges and one obstruction count based on misrepresentations made by the vessel’s captain to the US Coast Guard during the August 2015 boarding.
The plea materials were previously sealed to protect the integrity of the jury and the witnesses in the trial against the individual defendants.
The vessel’s operator had been indicted, along with the vessel’s owner, Aegeansun Gamma of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the tanker’s three engineers, on July 15, 2016.
The Green Sky’s captain, Genaro Anciano, also pleaded guilty to charges brought up against him.
The United States Coast Guard (USCG) may board US ships and foreign vessels in US waters in ports or at offshore terminals to verify whether the ship complies with the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL).
Image: The ship is not the T/V Green Sky or where the illegal discharge took place
