Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

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Apparently, the problem us not technical, but political. Offloading the product is relatively straightforward, but this is a platform used by Venezuela for oil processing. One would need to apply political pressure to force them to allow for offloading to prevent a marine life end environment catastrophe, as they are going to strongly assert the sovereign status (it's currently positioned in Venezuelan territorial waters) of the oil processing platform.

EDIT: Links moved from another comment as they are my citations for this comment.

Reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/jctitw/oil_tanker_w...

This comment in particular: https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/jctitw/comment/g93n...

According to Wikipedia [0] it's the US government who blocks offloading of the oil from this platform under the threat of sanctions, not the Venezuelan one. And the US sanctions is one of the factors which lead to this situation in the first place.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FSO_Nabarima

TIL! Thank you for sharing that important context!

According to the same article the platform was property of a US based multinational corporation and was seized by the Venezuelan government. Sanctions were warranted.

> was seized by the Venezuelan government

I don't see it in the article.

Even so, if a multinational is extracting resources from a country, I'd consider seizure of assets fair game, unless shown otherwise. It's not as if the companies are morally impeccable, poor countries rights and laws respected or even the international treaties fair.

No way to guarantee them the oil is still theirs / pay them for it? Probably worth a coalition ’buying’ that boat from them...

Probably. 60M gallon payload is roughly 1.43M barrels, assuming ~$42/barrel market price the fair market value to compensate Venezuela for the oil would be just a few dollars shy of $60 million. Throw in a little extra for assuming possession of the vessel and towing it to a ship breaking facility in Brownesville, Texas.

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