''Kitano'' was a Japanese

container ship A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...

. She was delivered in Japan in 1990 to Japanese container line NYK and

scrapped Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has monetary value, especially recovered me ...

in China in November 2011.

2001 fire

''Kitano'' left the Port of New York at 0730 on 21 March 2001. At 1600 ''Kitano''s crew observed that a container had caught fire. The container that caught fire contained 14 tons of activated carbon pellets impregnated with

potassium hydroxide Potassium hydroxide is an inorganic compound with the formula K OH, and is commonly called caustic potash. Along with sodium hydroxide (NaOH), KOH is a prototypical strong base. It has many industrial and niche applications, most of which exp ...

(caustic potash). Most of the pellets were in open mesh bags on wooden pallets. Two nearby containers were: ''"...loaded with barrels of camphene-90 wax, a class 4.1 dangerous cargo."'' At 1636 ''Kitano'' requested assistance.

Halifax, Nova Scotia Halifax is the capital and largest municipality of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, and the largest municipality in Atlantic Canada. As of the 2021 Census, the municipal population was 439,819, with 348,634 people in its urban area. The ...

, Canada was the nearest port.

Search and rescue Search and rescue (SAR) is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger. The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, typically determined by the type of terrain the search ...

aircraft were dispatched, as were several surface vessels, , and . When the vessels were dispatched the wind was at force 8. The weather conditions proved too extreme for the 140-ton ''Firebird'', the

Canadian Forces } The Canadian Armed Forces (CAF; french: Forces armées canadiennes, ''FAC'') are the unified military forces of Canada, including sea, land, and air elements referred to as the Royal Canadian Navy, Canadian Army, and Royal Canadian Air Force. ...

' dedicated fireboat, to leave harbour. The Canadian Coast Guard vessels arrived, but the weather prohibited anything beyond standing by. and arrived several hours later. arrived at 0500 the next morning. The vessel's Japanese owners contracted for assistance from Secunda Marine Services, the owners of the ocean-going salvage tug . It was not considered safe to allow ''Kitano'' to enter

Halifax Harbour Halifax Harbour is a large natural harbour on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, Canada, located in the Halifax Regional Municipality. Halifax largely owes its existence to the harbour, being one of the largest and deepest ice-free natural harbo ...

for almost 24 hours because of the danger of the fire spreading to the containers filled with camphene-90 wax. ''Kitano''s crew had been fighting the fire without assistance for 25 hours before they received any outside assistance due to the bad weather. The fire was extinguished by 2215. The contents of fifteen containers were damaged by the fire or by the fire fighting efforts. ''Kitano'' departed Halifax on 26 March 2001 with the rest of her cargo.

References

Ships of Japan 1989 ships {{Ship-stub