If you think that you are having a bad Monday morning, consider the plight of the master of the container ship MSC Luciana. The ship was bound from Antwerp to Felixstowe when it ran aground on a sand bar in the Westerschelde, the sea-channel that connects the port of Antwerp with the North Sea, about 140 kilometres (87 miles) southwest of Amsterdam. The MSC Luciana is one of the larger container ships in the world at 1,200 feet long and a container capacity of 11,600 TEU.   The ship reportedly ran aground at high tide. Zeeland Region Safety’s Aart Oosten is quoted as commenting, “She is well and truly stuck and we are also going into low tide, causing further difficulties.  At the moment, we have several groups including the Dutch maritime authorities in a meeting to see how we will proceed,” Oosten said, adding the Panamanian-registered ship posed no immediate danger to the environment. “There is no danger and her crew remains on board,” he said.”

Container ship stuck on Dutch sandbank

Thanks to Dirk Bal for passing the story along.