MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Ships sink in Montevideo Port dock collapse

Nobody was injured in the incident, Montevideo port authorities reported

A floating dock of the Tsakos shipping company in the port of Montevideo, where five ships were under repair, collapsed and two cranes fell into the water Thursday, leading to the partial sinking of three vessels, it was reported.

 Port Captain, Ricardo Della Santa said that for reasons “not yet defined” the dock belonging to the company Tsakos “began to take on water and flood its bow,” which triggered the collapse of “two cranes that operate on each of the bands of the dock.”

Un extraño incidente ocurrió esta madrugada en el dique de #Tsakos en el #puerto de #Montevideo. Por causas aún no precisadas las grúas comenzaron a funcionar solas. Cuatro barcos dañados y múltiples rotura a la infraestructura portuaria. Crédito imagen: a quien corresponda pic.twitter.com/Fr4GEJt6C0

— Marcelo Gallardo (@emepege) December 8, 2022

One of the cranes reportedly cut the dam's electrical power supply cable, which “prevented the dam from using its pumps to correct the situation that was occurring and, therefore, the dam ended up being completely flooded and going to the sunken position,” Della Santa also explained.

At the time of this incident, there were five ships under repair on the dock's plateau, three of which had “their live work open, that is, repairs in the submerged part of the hull,” which caused them to also flood and end up semi-sunken, Della Santa elaborated. The other two boats under repair were left afloat and “removed from the dock,” he added.

According to Uruguayan media, the National Ports Administration (ANP) confirmed that none of the workers present were injured, although 40 of them needed to be rescued by firefighters and other first responders.