Seawater being used to put out fire on a cargo ship wreckage off the Georgia coast

The wreckage of a cargo ship off the Georgia coast caught fire during salvage operations on Friday and seawater is being used to extinguish the blaze, according to the US Coast Guard.

The wreckage of the 656-foot Golden Ray caught fire just after lunchtime during cutting operations and spread to some of the vehicles remaining on what’s left of the ship, Coast Guard Cmdr. Efren Lopez said in a news conference.

The fire is located on the top decks, Lopez said.

Seawater is being used to put out the fire instead of chemicals, he said, minimizing any environmental concerns.

The Coast Guard also is monitoring air quality around the vessel and has not seen anything that would cause concern, Lopez said.

Once the fire is put out, an assessment will be done to see how the fire started, he said.

Responders were conducting pre-cutting operations and actively using fire-suppression systems as a preventative measure when the fire began, Lopez said, adding that the Coast Guard anticipated fires breaking out as workers began work on cutting the wreckage.

No injuries were reported, Lopez said. Nonessential crew members were evacuated from the VB-10,000, the 255-foot-tall crane vessel that does the cutting and lifting of the wreckage, Lopez said.

The cargo ship, carrying more than 4,000 vehicles, capsized on September 8, 2019, in St. Simons Sound near Jekyll Island. Four crew members trapped in the wreckage after the ship capsized were rescued.

The wreckage has remained in the water ever since then. The Coast Guard and other agencies developed a plan to remove the wreckage, which began in earnest in November 2020 after delays due to the coronavirus pandemic and last summer’s active hurricane season.

The removal plan calls for the ship to be cut into eight giant pieces with a giant diamond-cutting chain suspended from the VB-10,000.

So far, four sections have been removed, the latest being the ship’s engine section, which was removed on May 8.

The VB-10,000 vessel doing the cutting comprises two metal towers, about 240 feet tall, each connected to a barge and to each other at the top. A crane will remove the sections after they have brackets attached to the side, the vessel will move, and the crane will put each section on a barge, which will take them to a recycling facility in Louisiana.