Japanese carrier nets $1 million fine for pollution

Nitta Kisen Kaisha admits deliberately discharging oily bilge into the waters off North Carolina last year.    The U.S. Justice Department said Japanese ocean carrier Nitta Kisen Kaisha was fined $1 million by a federal district court on Thursday for the cover-up of one of its ships deliberately discharging oily bilge last year into the waters off North Carolina.
   The discharges were made from the ship Atlantic Oasis, which delivered steel products to North Carolina’s Port of Wilmington. The ship’s former chief engineer, Jihnyun Youn, already has been convicted and sentenced for falsifying the ship’s oil record book.
   In court, the company admitted that its engineers failed to document the illegal discharge of oily wastes from the vessel’s fuel and lubrication oil purifier systems, as well as discharges of oily bilge waste from the bilge holding tank and from the vessel’s bilges. 
   During a Coast Guard inspection of the ship on May 17, 2017, a junior engineering crewman provided information to the inspectors about how the oily wastes were being discharged under the chief engineer’s orders. The crewman also showed the Coast Guard inspectors where the hoses that were used for the discharges were hidden on the ship. 
   At first, Youn lied to the Coast Guard inspectors about the discharges, but then admitted the activity. He was placed on probation for one year and ordered to pay a $5,500 fine, the Justice Department said.
   In addition to the fine, Nitta also was placed on a three-year probation and ordered to implement a court-approved environmental compliance plan.