Everyday life of capitalism: where do giant ships go after death?

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

Residents of Bangladesh, in search of earnings, do not shy away from the most dangerous occupation - the analysis of ships that have served their time.

I was immediately given to understand that it would not be easy to get to where they are engaged in the disposal of sea vessels. “Previously, tourists were taken here,” says one of the local residents. - They were shown how people dismantle multi-ton constructions with their bare hands. But now there is no way for newcomers to come here."

I walked a couple of kilometers on the road that runs along the Bay of Bengal north of Chittagong town to where 80 shipbreaking yards are located on a 12-kilometer stretch of coastline. Each is hidden behind a high fence covered with barbed wire, there are guards everywhere and signs prohibiting photography hang. Strangers are not favored here.

Recycling of ships in developed countries is highly regulated and very costly, so this dirty work is done mainly by Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.

In the evening I hired a fishing boat and decided to take a trip to one of the shipyards. Thanks to the tide, we easily scurried between the huge oil tankers and container ships, hiding in the shadows of their giant pipes and hulls. Some ships still remained intact, others resembled skeletons: stripped of their steel sheathing, they exposed the insides of deep dark holds. Sea giants serve an average of 25-30 years, most of those delivered for disposal were launched in the 1980s. Now that the increased cost of insurance and maintenance has made older ships unprofitable, their value lies in the steel of the hulls.

We found ourselves here at the end of the day, when the workers were already leaving for their homes, and the ships rested in silence, occasionally disturbed by the splash of water and the clink of metal from their belly. The air smelled of sea water and fuel oil. Making our way along one of the ships, we heard ringing laughter and soon saw a group of boys. They floundered near a half-submerged metal skeleton: they climbed on top of it and dived into the water. Nearby, fishermen set up nets in the hope of a good catch of rice fish, a local delicacy.

Suddenly, quite close to a height of several floors, a sheaf of sparks fell. “You can't come here! - the worker shouted from above. - What, tired of living?

Ocean vessels are designed for years of servicein extreme conditions. No one thinks that sooner or later they will have to be taken apart into pieces, many of which will contain toxic materials like asbestos and lead. Recycling of ships in developed countries is highly regulated and very costly, so this dirty work is done mainly by Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. The labor force is very cheap here, and there is almost no control whatsoever.

True, the situation in the industry is gradually improving, but this process is very protracted. For example, India has finally introduced new requirements for the safety of workers and the environment. However, in Bangladesh, where as many as 194 ships were dismantled last year, this work remains very dangerous.

Along with this, he brings in a lot of money. Activists say that in three to four months, having invested about five million dollars in the dismantling of one ship at a shipyard in Bangladesh, an average of up to a million in profits can be made. Jafar Alam, the former head of an association of shipbreaking companies in Bangladesh, disagrees with these numbers: "It all depends on the class of the ship and on many other factors, such as current steel prices."

Whatever the profit, it cannot arise from scratch: more than 90% of materials and equipment find a second life.

The process begins with the purchase of the vessel by a recycling company from an international used vessel broker. To deliver the ship to the site of disassembly, the company hires a captain who specializes in "parking" huge ships on a strip of beach a hundred meters wide. After the ship gets stuck in the coastal sand, all liquids are drained from it and sold: the remains of diesel fuel, engine oil and fire-fighting substances. Then mechanisms and internal equipment are removed from it. Everything is on sale, without exception, from huge engines, batteries and kilometers of copper wiring, ending with bunks where the crew slept, portholes, lifeboats and electronic devices from the captain's bridge.

Then the devastated building is clung to by workers who have come to work from the poorest regions of the country. First, they dismember the ship with acetylene cutters. Then the movers drag the fragments to the shore: the steel will be melted down and sold - it will be used in the construction of buildings.

“Good business, you say? But just think of the chemicals that are poisoning our earth! - Mohammed Ali Shahin, an activist of the NGO Shipbreaking Platform, is outraged. "You have not yet seen young widows, whose husbands died under structures that fell off or suffocated in the holds." For 11 years out of 37, Shahin has been trying to draw public attention to the hard labor of workers in shipyards. The entire industry, he said, is controlled by several influential Chittagong families who also own related businesses, such as metal smelting.

Shahin is well aware that his country is in dire need of jobs. “I am not demanding a complete cessation of ship recycling,” he says. “We just need to create normal working conditions.” Shahin is convinced that not only unprincipled compatriots are to blame for the current situation. “Who in the West will allow the environment to be polluted in the open by dismantling ships right on the beach? Then why is it considered normal to get rid of the ships that have become unnecessary here, paying pennies and constantly endangering the life and health of people? - he is indignant.

Going to the nearby barracks, I saw the workers for whom Shahin was so offended. Their bodies are covered with deep scars, which are here called "Chittagong tattoos." Some men miss their fingers.

In one of the huts, I met a family in which four sons worked at a shipyard. The elder, 40-year-old Mahabab, once witnessed the death of a person: a fire in the hold broke out from a cutter. “I didn’t even come to this shipyard for money, afraid that they wouldn’t just let me go,” he said. "The owners don't like to wash dirty linen in public."

Mahabab shows a photo on the shelf: “This is my brother Jahangir. He was engaged in metal cutting at Ziri Subedar's shipyard, where he died in 2008.” Together with other workers, the brother unsuccessfully tried for three days to separate a large section from the ship's hull. Then a downpour began, and the workers decided to hide under it. At this moment, the structure could not stand it and came off.

The third brother, 22-year-old Alamgir, is not at home now. Working on a tanker, he fell through a hatch and flew 25 meters. Fortunately for him, water accumulated at the bottom of the hold, it softened the blow from the fall. Alamgir's partner climbed down on a rope and pulled him out of the hold. The very next day Alamgir quit his job, now he delivers tea to the managers of the shipyard in the office.

The younger brother Amir works as a worker's assistant and also cuts metal. He is a wiry 18-year-old with no scars on his smooth skin yet. I asked Amir if he was afraid to work, knowing what had happened to the brothers. “Yes,” he replied with a shy smile. Suddenly, during our conversation, the roof trembled with a roar. There was a sound like a thunderclap. I looked out into the street. “Ah, a piece of metal fell off the ship,” Amir said indifferently. "We hear that every day."

Marine Recycling Centers: Map

You can view the map in full size here.

At low tide, workers drag a five-ton rope to pull the fragments of the ship, which are formed during its disassembly, ashore with a winch.

These guys claim that they are already 14 - it is from this age that they are allowed to work in ship recycling. The owners of the shipyards give preference to young dismantlers - they are cheaper and are unaware of the danger that threatens them. In addition, they can get into the most inaccessible corners of the ship.

Steel from the hulls of ships is cut out in fragments, each of which weighs at least 500 kilograms. Using the materials at hand as linings, the movers drag these sections onto the trucks. Pieces of steel will be melted down into rebar and used in the construction of buildings.

For days, movers do not crawl out of the mud, which contains impurities of heavy metals and toxic paint: such mud spreads from ships throughout the district at high tide.

The workers armed with cutters work in pairs, protecting each other. It will take them three to six months to completely disassemble the vessel, depending on its size.

It took several days to cut through the decks of the Leona I. And now a huge part of it suddenly separates, "spitting out" the steel fragments in the direction where the shipyard authorities are located. This dry cargo ship was built in Croatia, in the city of Split, 30 years ago - this is the average service life of large sea vessels.

Workers warm themselves by the fire using gaskets removed from pipe connections, not thinking that such gaskets may contain asbestos.

About 300 people gathered for the funeral of Rana Babu from the village of Dunot at the foot of the Himalayas. The wound was only 22 years old, he worked on the dismantling of the ship and died from an explosion of accumulated gas. “We are burying a young guy,” laments one of those who came to say goodbye. "When will this end?"

Indian coast of the dead ships

Alang - "Coast of the Dead", such a resounding nickname was given to the coast of the town of Alang, which is 50 km from Bhavnagar, India. Alang has become the world's largest site for the division of scrapped ships. Official statistics are rather stingy, and in general Indian statistics do not suffer from an excess of thoroughness and accuracy, and in the case of Alang, the situation is further complicated by the fact that quite recently the place was the object of close attention of organizations dealing with human rights. However, even what can be collected makes a strong impression.

The Alang coast is divided into 400 cutting sites called local "platforms". They simultaneously employ 20,000 to 40,000 workers, manually dismantling ships. On average, the ship has about 300 workers, in two months the ship is completely dismantled for scrap metal. About 1,500 ships are cut every year, practically of all conceivable classes and types - from warships to supertankers, from container ships to research vessels.

Since the working conditions are indescribably terrible and difficult, and there is absolutely no safety precautions - and they do not even know such words there - Alang has become a magnet for the poor people of India, who are ready to do anything for a chance to get at least some kind of work. Alang has a lot of residents of the states of Orissa and Bihar, some of the poorest in India, but actually there are people everywhere, from Tamil Nadu to Nepal.

The word "platform" when applied to the coast of Alang is a clear exaggeration. This is nothing more than just a piece of the beach. Before setting up the next vessel for cutting, this piece, called the platform, is cleaned of the remains of the previous poor fellow - that is, they are not just cleaned, but literally licked, down to the last screw and bolt. Absolutely nothing is lost. Then the ship intended for scrapping is accelerated to full speed and jumps out onto the platform intended for it on its own. The landing operation is meticulously worked out and goes without a hitch.

The Alang coast is ideal for this kind of work and this way - the fact is that a really high tide occurs only twice a month, it is at this time that ships are thrown ashore. Then the water subsides, and the ships are completely on the shore. The actual cutting is striking in its thoroughness - at first, absolutely everything that can be removed and separated as something separate and suitable for further use is removed - doors and locks, engine parts, beds, mattresses, galley harvesters and life jackets … Then they cut, piece by piece, the entire body … Scrap metal itself - parts of the hull, cladding, etc., are taken out on trucks somewhere straight for smelting or to places where scrap metal is collected, and huge warehouses that stretch along the road leading from the coast are clogged with all sorts of spare parts that are still usable.