A complete crane has been removed from the water on the border of the North Sea and the Wadden Sea. The crane has been lying on the bottom of the sea for more than 28 years.
The crane was retrieved during a cleanup operation by CleanUpXL, a project set up after the container disaster with the ship MSC Zoe in 2019. According to project leader Ellen Kuipers, the crane was on the deck of a Norwegian ship that ran into problems during a severe storm in 1995. hit.
The crane was hoisted out of the water with the help of a huge scaffolding:
“Coincidentally, just like the MSC Zoe in the night of 1 to 2 January,” Kuipers told Omrop Fryslân. The ship was rudderless and wrecked after breaking into two pieces. The ship was salvaged, but the crane remained.
‘Special find’
It was known that the crane had never been found, but the participants in the clean-up campaign were not aware of this. “We received a tip, as is often the case, that something must be there. We only knew that there were deck hatches,” says Kuipers.
According to her, the crane is almost intact. “It was a big challenge to unload it in Harlingen. They put it on shore with three other cranes.”
Large objects are often fished up during clean-ups, but the crane is a special find, according to Kuipers. “We have also found truck trailers, but this is a highlight. There is so much rubbish in the sea, we will probably find more.”
