Oil Sea

Maltese tanker collided with a Chinese boat in thick fog off the northern port of Tianjin and as a result the tanker spilled oil. A Chinese crew is working to clean up an oil spill from a Maltese tanker.

The "Tasman Sea" tanker, carrying 80,000 tonnes of crude oil, had leaked a slick 2.5 miles long and 1.4 miles wide into the Bohai Sea.

Last week, a tanker carrying 77,000 tonnes of fuel oil broke in half and sank off the northern coast of Spain, gushing thousands of tonnes of oil that has blackened miles of Spanish coastline.

Flames are smouldering aboard another tanker carrying 20,000 tonnes of inflammable gas off Hong Kong.

Two small fuel ships exploded near the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou last week, causing more than 300 tonnes of diesel to burn or spill into the water.