Proposal for a New Traffic Separation Scheme in the Canary Islands

Abstract

The waters of the archipelago of the Canary Islands are an obligatory route of passage for around 7,000 vessels per year and there is also a traffic between the islands of around 30,000 vessels per year whose destination or point of origin is one of the island ports. A large number of these vessels are tankers loaded with all kinds of dangerous cargoes, which means an additional risk should an accident involving one of them occur in the waters surrounding the islands. The experts agree that the effects of a petrol tanker accident in the Canary Islands would lead to the economic and ecological collapse of the archipelago. In the present paper, bearing in mind the points mentioned above, and in view of the last event of pollution caused by the sinking of the Oleg Naydenov and the unexpected behavior of the subsequent spill, proposals are made for the setting up of two new TSS to the west of the Canary Islands for those vessels in transit that will not be calling at a port of the archipelago, leaving the current schemes for the traffic whose destination is one of the islands. Also will be demonstrated that the implantation of the new TSS would not involve a significant increase in trip times or expenses for vessels sailing through them, as compared to the current routes.