To talk about the Prestige is to talk about one of the biggest ecological catastrophes that has occurred in Galicia and Spain in recent years. The Prestige was a Liberian monohull ship that at the time of the sinking was transporting 77,000 tons of fuel from Latvia to Gibraltar. .
On November 13, 2002, the ship was involved in a storm of up to 50 knots of wind and waves of 6 meters, which caused irreversible damage to the prestige and condemned it to sink.
They managed to rescue 27 crew members from the ship, and while the Spanish government, following orders from the then Minister of Public Works, Francisco Álvarez Cascos, tried to move the ship as far away from the Galician coast as possible, it broke in half, sinking to a depth of 3,850 meters and at a distance of 250 kilometers from the coast.
The ecological and economic damage to the area was disastrous, and even still has repercussions today. On January 2, 2003, the remains of fuel spilled by the ship were found only 50 kilometers from the coast and later the remains reached the coast.
The economic consequences of the catastrophe were enormous, the then Minister of Agriculture, Miguel Arias Cañete, estimated losses of 24 million euros per month due to the loss of activity in the fishing sector in the area and reported it to the international compensation fund. of hydrocarbon damage, losses of 795.5 million euros.
But perhaps the most serious part of the entire catastrophe was the number of birds and other animals on the Spanish, Portuguese and French coasts that were found dead because of the oil spilled into the sea.
After the disaster, all monohull ships similar to the Prestige were removed from the coasts of Spain and France, and monohull oil tankers like the one that caused the misfortune were banned throughout the European Union.
Even today, remains of fuel are still being found near the Galician coast and the name of the prestige rings again 10 years later, since the trial has been postponed to November of this year, the date on which the accused will begin to testify. of the case.