All-women marching band livens up Taiwanese funerals

Changhua (Taiwan) (AFP) – At a funeral in rural Taiwan, musicians wearing pleated mini-skirts and go-go boots march around a coffin to the beat of the 1980s hit "I Hate Myself for Loving You".

Da Zhong women's group is part of a long tradition of funeral marching bands performing in Taiwan for families wanting to give their loved ones an upbeat send-off

 © I-HWA CHENG / AFP

 13/03/2025

The performance in a Changhua County farming community is a modern mash-up of ancient Chinese funeral rites and folk traditions, with saxophones, rock music and daring outfits.

Da Zhong women's group is part of a long tradition of funeral marching bands performing in mostly rural areas of Taiwan for families wanting to give their loved ones an upbeat send-off.

The band was composed mainly of men when it started 50 years ago and has evolved into an all-women ensemble.

"I constantly try to innovate, come up with new ideas, and adapt to modern times," said band manager Hsu Ya-tzu, 46, whose mother-in-law founded the group.

"I want to break away from rigid traditional mindsets to keep this profession relevant."

AFP journalists joined Da Zhong as they performed their choreographed routines in handmade white-and-sky-blue uniforms at three funerals over two days.

Starting before dawn, the women marched in formation playing their saxophones and a drum as the leader twirled her baton and blew a whistle.

Funeral director Chang Chen-tsai says marching band performances were supposed to 'liven up the atmosphere' of funerals © I-Hwa Cheng / AFP

The music was loud enough to wake the nearby living as they led the coffin and mourners to a cemetery or crematorium where traditional funeral rites were performed.

"It felt like a celebration, almost like a joyous occasion rather than a funeral," mourner Hsiao Lin Hui-hsiang, 74, told AFP as his family cremated an elderly relative.

"Since she lived past 90, it was considered a happy farewell."

Funeral director Chang Chen-tsai said marching band performances were supposed to "liven up the atmosphere" of funerals and were usually reserved for the old.

"It should be lively, it cannot be too quiet," said Chang, 64, who has been organising funerals for 40 years.

Lipstick, white boots

It was still dark out when Hsu pulled up in her van at a meeting point to collect other band members for an early morning gig.

The women aged from 22 to 46 applied lipstick and pulled on white boots before grabbing their instruments and walking to the covered courtyard venue where mourners gathered near the coffin.

Da Zhong band was composed mainly of men when it started 50 years ago and has evolved into an all-female ensemble © I-Hwa Cheng / AFP

Hsu's mother-in-law, Hung Sa-hua, recalls being one of the only women in the funeral marching band profession when she started her own group in 1975.

As the male performers got old and retired, she replaced them with women, which customers preferred, the 72-year-old said.

For Hung, the band was an opportunity to make some extra money after she married her husband and to get out of the family home.

"If I never went out and always stayed at home, I wouldn't have known what was happening in society," Hung told AFP.

- 'Constantly innovating' -

Taiwan's funeral marching bands are rooted in Chinese and folk rituals, and during the last century began using Western instruments, said Wu Ho-yu, 56, a high school music teacher who has studied the tradition.

"Since people appreciate its entertainment aspect, bands continue following this style, constantly innovating to offer something even better," Wu said.

Hsu said the band had changed with the times. Many years ago, for example, the women wore trousers but now super-short skirts were acceptable.

Taiwan's funeral marching bands are rooted in Chinese and folk rituals, and during the last century began using Western instruments 

© I-Hwa Cheng / AFP

Finding new performers was a challenge due to the early morning starts, said Hsu, who has expanded into birthday parties, company year-end events and grand openings.

"Nowadays, fewer and fewer people are willing to enter this industry," she said.

"We are all getting older, but this job needs young people to carry it forward, it requires energy, and only with energy can it truly shine."

Hsu said she introduced rock songs -- such as "I Hate Myself for Loving You" by US band Joan Jett and the Blackhearts and "Leaving the Face of the Earth (Jump!)" by Taiwanese group Mayday -- into their repertoire to give their act a more contemporary sound.

Some elderly mourners initially objected, but younger ones embraced it.

"As long as it's a song the deceased wanted to hear, anything is okay," Hsu said.

"The old traditions, where certain songs were considered taboo, no longer apply."

© 2025 AFP

 

Crews from Solong and Stena Immaculate Return Home as Salvage Continues

Crew saved from the Stena Immaculate in the UK (Crowley)

Published Mar 20, 2025 4:42 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

Officials in the UK and the Philippines confirmed that the crewmembers of the containership Solong and tanker Stena Immaculate have been repatriated as the investigation into the incident continues. HM Coastguard gave its last daily update this morning, March 20, while a government minister traveled to the area to thank the brave first responders and civilian crews that saved the seafarers as the vessels were engulfed in flames.

UK Transport Minister Mike Kane visited Grimsby Docks meeting with personnel from HM Coastguard as well as the teams from offshore wind operator RWE and Windcat which provides the crew transfer services from the port. He praised the actions of the commercial crews and thanked everyone for their efforts which saved the crews. 

"As the minister for aviation, maritime, and security, I wanted to come as soon as humanly possible after the initial response to the incident to come and thank everybody involved," said Kane.  He called the efforts "an astonishingly brilliant operation."

Kane highlighted that Windcat, contracted by RWE to assist with the transport of its technicians to RWE's Humber Gateway offshore wind farm, was first on the scene. The Windcat crew transfer vessel had completed taking technicians out to the wind farm and was 12 minutes away when the Mayday calls were issued.

The Solong crew was in a lifeboat when the Windcat vessel arrived, took them aboard, and brought them ashore. A second vessel repeated the same process rescuing the crew of Stena Immaculate which had also abandoned the tanker aboard its lifeboat.

The 36 individuals were triaged at Grimsby Dock. They were treated on scene and one person who had been injured declined further medical assistance. Kane reported that the crews have now been repatriated. The UK’s Marine Accident Investigation Branch reported that it was conducting interviews and gathering information as part of its investigation into the incident.

 

Philippines released a picture reporting eight crewmembers had returned (DMW)

 

The Philippines’ Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) reported today, March 20, that eight crewmembers from the Solong had returned to the country on March 18. It said it was in contact to provide financial assistance and ensure that all the necessary government assistance and support would be provided. Migrant Workers Secretary Hans Leo Cacdac previously said the DMW is also mulling taking legal action against the manning agency of the Filipino seafarers. He said they were also assisting the family of the seafarer who was lost during the incident.

The other crewmembers from the Solong were reported to include Russian nationals. There was no indication where they are or how many Russians were working on the containership.

UK prosecutors confirmed that the captain of the Solong, Vladimir Motin, 59 years old, of Primorsky, St Petersburg, Russia, was charged with Gross Negligence Manslaughter on March 14. He is being held in jail waiting for his next court appearance in April.

U.S. operator Crowley has also issued a statement expressing its “heartfelt thank you” to the 23 mariners from the Stena Immaculate for their bravery and quick action during the allision. It said that their actions helped safeguard lives, the vessel, and the environment.

Salvage teams have now been aboard both vessels to conduct surveys and plan the next steps. At the same time, UK officials highlighted that counter pollution retrieval operations remain ongoing. HM Coastguard said that aerial surveillance flights continue to monitor both vessels and the retrieval operation.

UK

‘Money for war, but for not the poor’: ex-Labour candidate hits out against welfare cuts

Olivia Barber 

Yesterday
Left Foot Forward News

Faiza Shaheen said she was "upset and shocked" by how a Labour government is treating people on benefits as if they're cheating

Faiza Shaheen, ex-Labour parliamentary candidate for Chingford and Woodford Green, has slammed the government’s planned disability benefit cuts, urging them to tax the ultra-rich instead.

During BBC Question Time last night, an audience member asked: “If the proposed benefit cuts are supposed to get people back to work, how do you genuinely ensure that genuinely unwell people are not going to be impoverished?”

Host Fiona Bruce then asked Shaheen whether she believed cuts to the government’s £65 billion incapacity benefit bill were necessary.

Shaheen said she opposes directly cutting people’s money, then added, to cheers from the audience: “It’s really striking isn’t it in the last few weeks, there’s always money for war, but not for the poor.”

The economist and activist said that her own mother had been on disability benefits, “She had heart failure, did she want heart failure? Absolutely not.”

Under Tory austerity, Shaheen said that the DWP “came, they harrassed her, it was absolutely heartbreaking to see”.

Shaheen, who ran as an independent candidate at the general election after being deselected by Labour, said she was “upset and shocked” that a Labour government is treating people on benefits as if they’re “all cheating”.

Emma Reynolds, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, said: “We’re not saying that”. Shaheen said “That is the implication for always going for this group of people”.

She went on to say there are “much better ideas” for saving money, including taxing the ultra-rich and introducing a 2% tax on individuals with over £10 million, which she said would generate £24 billion per year.

Bruce pointed out that many countries have introduced wealth taxes and “either abandoned them because they haven’t worked or because they have brought in so little money”.

She said: “So I worked with governments around the world actually, that were looking at this.

“And one thing they did was that they were very clear about what the money was going to be used for. They spoke about it in terms of solidarity. And so the public was really behind it. And so the rich knew that there wasn’t really much they could do to and argue against it.”

TUC general secretary warns Starmer that cutting PIP is ‘not the solution’

Olivia Barber 

12 March, 2025

Left Foot Forward

Paul Nowak has said the government must not make the same mistakes as the Tories

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Paul Nowak, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, has warned Keir Starmer that cutting Personal Independence Payment (PIP) “is not the solution” after 14 years of Tory austerity.

Furthermore, Nowak added that cutting disability will make current challenges worse and be unpopular with the public.

In a rare public criticism of the government, the TUC leader said: “A major lesson from the Tory years is that austerity damaged the nation’s health. We must not make the same mistake again.

“Pushing disabled people into hardship with cuts to support will only make the current challenges worse – and will not win public support.”

He added that “after 14 disastrous years of Tory rule”, a lot needs to be done to improve public services.

“But cutting PIP is not the solution – not least because it enables many disabled people to access work so that they do not have to rely on out of work benefits,” he said.

Nowak said that Labour should prioritise fixing problems with PIP, “with input from trade unions and organisations led by disabled people”.

Opposition to Labour’s plans for £5 billion in welfare spending cuts is growing. Over the weekend, Rachael Maskell MP expressed that Labour colleagues have voiced “deep, deep concern” about the proposed reforms.

On BBC Radio 4 this morning, Labour MP Nadia Whittome, said that the party is “getting it badly wrong” on welfare reform.

“It is not disabled people who crashed the economy or who were responsible for low wages or rising rents or falling living standards – we must not scapegoat them for the failures and political choices of Conservative governments,” she said.

Asked if she would rebel on this issue, Whittome, who was on disability benefits as a teenager, said: “I can’t look my constituents in the eye. I can’t look my mum in the eye and support this.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

The Hidden Face of Female Poverty in the UK

On International Women’s Day, Aisha Maniar looks at how poverty is holding back progress towards gender equality.

Poverty poses a major obstacle and block to progressing women’s rights and improving the lives of women and, subsequently, much of the rest of society all over the world. Women make up the majority of people living in poverty worldwide including the United Kingdom, the sixth largest economy in the world. International Women’s Day offers a timely opportunity to shed light on the often overlooked gendered nature of poverty in Britain today.

One in five, or 14.3 million people, in Britain currently live in poverty, defined by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation as individuals whose “resources are well below what is enough to meet your minimum needs, including taking part in society” (2025 UK Poverty report). For women, the figure is higher; they are likely to have a persistently low income, acquire debt and be more entrenched in poverty than men. Women from ethnic minorities and with disabilities experience poverty at higher rates, and there is also a north/south divide in the level and impact of female poverty.

Higher female poverty in the UK can be broadly attributed to the same factors as in many other countries in the world: lower pay, the gender pay gap, and the far higher burden of unpaid care work placed on women. Women contribute billions of pounds in unpaid care work annually to the economy and absorb the burden of many of the cuts to public and support services for children, the elderly and disabled.

With women holding almost two-thirds of low-paid, part-time and insecure jobs, opportunities to save and work themselves out of poverty and debt diminish. It also means that many women continue to experience poverty into retirement. In the past decade, the “the proportion of female pensioners in the UK living in poverty has increased by six percentage points”, with over 1.25 million female pensioners “living below the breadline.” 

The impact is not just on earnings and savings but on all aspects of life. The stigma and shame attached to poverty mean that women very often suffer invisibly. Food poverty means many mothers reduce their food intake to ensure their children are properly fed. A 2023 Action Aid report found that period poverty increased by almost 20% in the year before.

One of the more visible aspects of widespread poverty in the UK today is homelessness. Women, for their own safety, are once again largely invisible. Government statistics report that women make up around 15% of rough sleepers nationwide. The first national women’s rough sleeping census held by Solace Women’s Aid in 2023 found that “In the 41 local areas that took part in the Census, 815 women were identified compared to just 189 through the Government’s Rough Sleeping Census.”

Off the streets, women make up over 60% of homeless adults in temporary accommodation, with this number having doubled in the past decade. Poor, unsuitable and precarious housing options for women add to the silent suffering, and often prevent women, with or without children, leaving abusive relationships and domestic violence.

A further invisible impact is on women’s health. Austerity measures have seen life expectancy fall over the past decade. The disparity in the life expectancy of the average woman and women living in poverty is almost one decade. For women experiencing sleeping rough, a life expectancy of 43 is almost half that of the average woman.

These are not just statistics but the everyday precarious living conditions and inequality experienced by millions of women across the UK. Poverty is not the result of the poor lifestyle choices of individuals but of deliberate punitive choices made by politicians.

There is much to be done to reverse growing gender inequality and the regression of women’s rights due to poverty. The current Labour government has failed thus far to take positive action, such as scrapping the two-child limit for universal credit support and addressing the detriment to millions of women affected by the rise in pension age.

Just some of the many steps that need to be taken immediately to address poverty and its impact on women’s rights in the UK include rethinking cuts to council budgets that force the burden of social care onto women as unpaid care work, increasing funding for women’s organisations who understand the particular challenges all kinds of women face, and public investment in childcare, making it affordable to allow women to access their rights and participate more fully and equally in society.

Aisha Maniar is a human rights activist.

Image: https://www.goodfon.com/holidays/wallpaper-zhenskiy-den-pozdravlyayu-8.html Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International CC BY-NC 4.0 Deed

End gender pension and pay gap so millions won’t retire as poor as their grandmothers

The National Pensioners Convention is calling for an end to the iniquitous gender pension gap which leaves many women pensioners in poverty.

Ahead of International Women’s Day, the NPC is also calling for a bridging of the gender pay gap to allow today’s female workers to earn enough to afford higher pension contributions and avoid falling into the poverty trap like their grandmothers.

More than one in five women pensioners in the UK are estimated to live in poverty compared to one in four men, and the figure is higher among single women.  Those, particularly older women who live alone, make up the biggest proportion of the two million pensioners currently living in poverty in the UK. 

Research by the Pension Policy Institute (PPI) for their 2024 Gender Pensions Gap Report found women on average retire with pension savings of £69,000, compared to £205,000 for men. The report concluded: “In order to close this gap, a girl would need to start pension saving at just three years old.”

Jan Shortt, NPC General Secretary, said: “The theme of International Women’s Day on 8th March is a call to ‘Accelerate Action’ on gender equality. That’s why the NPC will be writing to the Ministers for Women and Equalities and the Department for Work and Pensions – Bridget Phillipson MP and Liz Kendall MP – urging them to end the iniquitous pensions gap that means millions of particularly older and vulnerable women are living in poverty.

“Most people do not understand our two-tier state pension system which means more than two thirds of our 12.5 million pensioners – those who retired before 2016 – receive much lower pensions than the new state pension figures often quoted in the press.”

The gap is largely due to older women in their late 70s, 80s and 90s who retired before 2016 having much lower state pensions, and occupational pensions because they took time out of work for family responsibilities.  And they might not have been able to pay enough National Insurance to ensure that they even receive the basic/old rate.

Jan Shortt added: “The NPC is campaigning for everyone who retires – no matter their age, gender or contributions – to receive the same basic state pension, set at 70% of the living wage and above the official poverty level.

“No one should be penalised because of their circumstances from having a decent quality of life in retirement – and this starts with a decent income.  But striving to bridge the gender pay gap to allow more women to afford higher personal pension contributions is equally important, and something any decent society should be committee to.”

 The “NPC is also advocating for the WASPI women to receive the compensation the Ombudsman recommended and not be ignored by the government. Rightly, successive governments wanted to equalise the retirement age for men and women – but the way it was done for those ‘50s born WASPI women is grossly unfair.”

Image: https://www.flickr.com/photos/gordonmcmullan/5680454074/| London Mayday and Rally 2011 | Gordon McMullan | Flickr Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 Deed

UPDATED

US Tanker Busts into Flames After Being Hit by Containership off England

Containership hit the anchored Stena tanker off the coast of the UK (MCA)

Published Mar 10, 2025 11:03 AM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

[Breaking News] A rescue and fire control operation is underway off the eastern coast of England after a container vessel hit a tanker that was anchored offshore with reports of a massive fireball after the allision. Reports are that 32 crewmembers have been evacuated and brought to shore from the two ships with at least 13 being reported as causalities.

The UK Maritime and Coastguard Agency received reports of the ships being evacuated at 0948 local time. The vessels were reported to be near Hull, England. Four lifeboats from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution were dispatched along with helicopters and assistance from commercial vessels in the area. One of the Windcat crew vessels supporting the offshore wind industry reportedly provided transportation to shore for some of the causalities.

The Stena Immaculate (49,792 dwt) was reported to have been at anchor in the Immingham Anchorage having arrived from Greece. The vessel is operated by Crowley under the U.S. flag and owned by Stena Bulk. It is on a long-term charter as part of the U.S. Department of Defense Tanker Security Program. Stena told CNN that the 20 crewmembers from the vessel have been accounted for and are safe.

Crowley issued a statement confirming that all of its crewmembers are safe and reported the Stena Immaculate was loaded with Jet A-1 fuel. The vessel suffered a ruptured cargo tank causing the fuel to be released. They said there were multiple explosions and that the vessel was abandoned.

The tanker was struck by the Portuguese-flagged containership Solong, which is managed from Germany. The vessel is 9,300 dwt and 461 feet in length (141 meters) with a capacity of approximately 800 TEU. The vessel was sailing from Scotland to Rotterdam. The video also shows significant fire damage to the containership.

 

 

 

 

The circumstances of the incident remain unclear but the Guardian newspaper is quoting the UK Met Office saying there were likely areas of fog and low clouds in the region. They were predicted to be lifting as winds increased and the temperature rose. The forecast was for a hazy day.

UK Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander issued a statement thanking the emergency service workers who helped with the evacuations and are assisting in the ongoing operation.

Information from the scene of the incident is spotty as it is approximately 10 miles offshore. The RNLI last reported that three of its lifeboats remain on the scene and the firefight is ongoing. HM Coastguard in a statement said "an assessment of the likely counter pollution response required is being enacted."

Additional statements are expected from the authorities as the day continues.

What we know about the North Sea tanker collision


By AFP


March 10, 2025


View of the North Sea between the turrets of the entrance to the old pier in Withernsea, on the east coast of England near where a collision between a tanker and a cargo ship caused multiple explosions - Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP BRUCE BENNETT

Jet fuel caught fire and leaked into the North Sea on Monday after a cargo ship reportedly carrying sodium cyanide hit a tanker chartered by the US military off the British coast.

More than 30 people were injured, but all the tanker crew were reported rescued.

Here is what we know about the collision between the tanker Stena Immaculate and the container vessel Solong, which set off a major pollution alert on the British coast.



– Fuel tanker hit while anchored –



The Stena Immaculate, which was carrying the fuel, was at anchor about 10 miles (16 kilometres) off the eastern England port of Hull when it was “struck by the container ship Solong”, according to Crowley Maritime, the US shipping firm managing the tanker. The alarm was raised at 0948 GMT.

The Lloyd’s List maritime news outlet said the Solong was carrying 15 containers of sodium cyanide, a flammable gas.

A massive fire erupted and engulfed both vessels. Crowley Maritime said the tanker was carrying jet-A1 fuel and the US Defense Department has confirmed that the US military had chartered the vessel.

The tanker “crew abandoned the vessel following multiple explosions onboard” said Crowley Maritime, which is based in Jacksonville, Florida.

Around 32 people were brought ashore on three vessels, according to Grimsby port director Martyn Boyers. Stena Bulk, a Swedish company that owns the tanker, said all of the crew on the vessel were alive.

The 140-metre (460 feet) Portuguese-flagged “Solong” is owned by German company Reederei Koepping and was going from Grangemouth in Scotland to the Dutch port of Rotterdam, according to the Vessel Finder website.



– Ships ablaze –



Images showed flames and a thick cloud of black smoke rising from the wreck of the two ships. The UK Coastguard was coordinating a rescue and emergency pollution operation after Crowley Maritime said the impact had “ruptured” the tanker and set off a fire.

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) rescue service said there were reports of “fires on both ships”.

The government Marine Accident Investigation said it had a team at the scene already “gathering evidence” and assessing “next steps”.

A plane, lifeboats from coastal stations and other nearby vessels were in the rescue operation, the coastguard said.



– Humber traffic suspended –



Associated British Ports (ABP), which operates ports in Hull and Immingham, the stricken region, said it had halted all vessel movements in the Humber estuary that flows into the North Sea.

– Relatively rare –


The North Sea has busy shipping lanes but accidents are relatively rare.

In October 2023, two cargo ships, the Verity and the Polesie, collided near Germany’s Heligoland islands. Three people were killed and two others were listed as missing.

On October 6 2015, the freighter Flinterstar, carrying 125 tonnes of diesel and 427 tonnes of fuel oil, sank after colliding with the tanker Al Oraiq eight kilometres (five miles) off the Belgian coast.

A major oil spill hit the North Sea in January 1993 when the Liberian tanker Braer suffered engine damage while going from Norway to Canada. It ran aground off Scotland’s Shetland Islands and released 84,500 tonnes of crude oil.

– Proper lookout? –

David McFarlane of the Maritime Risk and Safety consultancy said there were 200 to 300 ship collisions around the world each year, but most are just a “slight bump” in a port.

“The collision regulations… state that all ships must maintain a proper lookout at all times. And clearly something has gone wrong here, because if a proper lookout had been maintained, this collision would have been avoided,” McFarlane told AFP.

When the flames die down investigators will look for the video data recorders on the two ships — the equivalent of a plane’s “black box” information recorders.

These should have information from the ships’ radar as well as voice recordings of the bridge teams. McFarlane said this would help investigators find out if there was communication between the two ships.

burs-tw/jkb/js

North Sea tanker and cargo ship collision injures 32


By  AFP
March 10, 2025

Akshata Kapoor, Olivier Devos

A major rescue operation was under way after a collision between an oil tanker and a cargo ship in the North Sea Monday which sparked a huge blaze and left 32 people injured.

The injured had been brought ashore for treatment “in three vessels”, the Grimsby port director Martin Boyers told AFP, adding that “ambulances were queueing on the quay”.

The operation was being coordinated by the UK Coastguard after “reports of a collision between a tanker and cargo vessel off the coast of East Yorkshire”, a Coastguard spokesperson said.

The spokesman added the Coastguard was carrying out an assessment of the likely counter pollution response required.

Images on UK television channels showed a huge plume of thick, black smoke and flames rising from the scene about 10 miles (16 kilometres) off the coast.

There were reports of “fires on both ships” that UK lifeboat services were responding to, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) confirmed to AFP.

There were also reports that “a number of people had abandoned the vessels”, RNLI added.

The International Maritime Organization confirmed to AFP “the current focus is on the firefighting and search and rescue operation”.

UK Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said she was “concerned to hear of the collision between two vessels in the North Sea this morning and am liaising with officials and HM Coastguard as the situation develops”.

She also thanked all the emergency services which rushed to the scene.

The alarm about the collision near the port city of Hull in East Yorkshire was raised at 0948 GMT.

A Coastguard helicopter, aircraft, lifeboats from four towns and other nearby vessels were part of the large rescue operation, the Coastguard added.

Swedish tanker company Stena Bulk confirmed it owned the oil tanker involved in the accident, adding that it was operated by Crowley, a US-based maritime company.

The tanker was named as the Stena Immaculate by online ship tracking service Marine Traffic, which said the vessel was anchored near its destination, Immingham, near Hull.

It had travelled from Greece loaded with petroleum products, according to Bloomberg.

An Associated British Ports (ABP), which operates the Port of Hull and Immingham, said it was “aware” of the incident and was “assisting” the Coastguard.

The MarineTraffic shipping tracker said the cargo ship involved was the Portuguese-flagged “Solong”, owned by the German company Reederei Koepping.



– Collisions rare –



Vessels with firefighting capabilities have been dispatched to the scene off the northeast coast.

Collisions remain rare in the busy North Sea.

In October 2023, two cargo ships, the Verity and the Polesie, collided near Germany’s Heligoland islands in the North Sea.

Three people were killed and two others are still missing, considered dead.

The Isle-of-Man-flagged Verity, which was carrying steel from the northern German port of Bremen to Immingham, sank.

In October 2015, the Flinterstar freighter — carrying 125 tonnes of diesel and 427 tonnes of fuel oil — sank after colliding with the Al Oraiq tanker eight kilometres (five miles) off the Belgian coast on October 6, 2015.

At Least 32 Casualties in Fiery North Sea Collision Between Oil Tanker and Cargo Ship

Advocates expressed concern for wildlife as emergency crews completed rescue and firefighting efforts.


An oil tanker and a cargo ship collided off the British coast in the North Sea on March 10, 2025.
(Photo: @SputnikIntl/X)

Julia Conley
Mar 10, 2025

COMMON DREAMS


This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...

British emergency workers on Monday were responding to a collision between an oil tanker and a cargo ship off the eastern coast of the United Kingdom in the North Sea.

At least 32 casualties were "brought ashore in Grimsby," a port town in Lincolnshire, reportedThe Guardian, and the two ships were believed to be a U.S.-flagged tanker called the MV Stena Immaculate and a cargo vessel called the Solong, which was headed for Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

Photos and videos posted on social media showed the vessels on fire and surrounded by thick black smoke.


Martyn Boyers, chief executive of the Port of Gimsby East, told the BBC that a "massive fireball" was seen erupting around the time of the collision.

"They must have sent a mayday out—luckily there was a crew transfer vessel out there already," said Boyers. "Since then there has been a flotilla of ambulances to pick up anyone they can find."

Boyers toldSky News that "a haze and a smog" had been reported off the coast on Monday.

"It's been very foggy, and the fog has never lifted. So I would imagine that at that time, when the accident took place, that there would have been fog," said Boyers. "Having said that all these vessels now... they've got every, every bit of kit that's known to man about how to navigate and radars and everything. So it's a very, very unusual and tragic accident."

His Majesty's Coastguard, the U.K. maritime agency, reported that an alarm was raised about the crash about 10 miles off the coast of East Yorkshire at 9:48 am local time.

The Solong appeared to have struck the oil tanker when it was anchored, according to tracking data.

The BBC reported Monday morning that all members of the Stena Immaculate crew had been accounted for and were safe; it was not clear whether there were still people in the Solong's crew who still needed to be located.

Climate campaigners have warned against continued oil extraction in the North Sea; in January, advocates celebrated as grassroots campaigners and groups won a lawsuit stopping two fossil fuel projects by Shell and Equinor from moving forward there.

David Steel, manager of the Isle of May National Nature Reserve, noted that the disaster happened just as seabirds' breeding season is about to begin.

"Seabirds pouring back into the North Sea as they head to colonies down east coast," said Steel, "and this is a breaking headline we didn't need today."

The Hidden Face of Female Poverty in the UK

MARCH 8, 2025

On International Women’s Day, Aisha Maniar looks at how poverty is holding back progress towards gender equality.

Poverty poses a major obstacle and block to progressing women’s rights and improving the lives of women and, subsequently, much of the rest of society all over the world. Women make up the majority of people living in poverty worldwide including the United Kingdom, the sixth largest economy in the world. International Women’s Day offers a timely opportunity to shed light on the often overlooked gendered nature of poverty in Britain today.

One in five, or 14.3 million people, in Britain currently live in poverty, defined by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation as individuals whose “resources are well below what is enough to meet your minimum needs, including taking part in society” (2025 UK Poverty report). For women, the figure is higher; they are likely to have a persistently low income, acquire debt and be more entrenched in poverty than men. Women from ethnic minorities and with disabilities experience poverty at higher rates, and there is also a north/south divide in the level and impact of female poverty.

Higher female poverty in the UK can be broadly attributed to the same factors as in many other countries in the world: lower pay, the gender pay gap, and the far higher burden of unpaid care work placed on women. Women contribute billions of pounds in unpaid care work annually to the economy and absorb the burden of many of the cuts to public and support services for children, the elderly and disabled.

With women holding almost two-thirds of low-paid, part-time and insecure jobs, opportunities to save and work themselves out of poverty and debt diminish. It also means that many women continue to experience poverty into retirement. In the past decade, the “the proportion of female pensioners in the UK living in poverty has increased by six percentage points”, with over 1.25 million female pensioners “living below the breadline.” 

The impact is not just on earnings and savings but on all aspects of life. The stigma and shame attached to poverty mean that women very often suffer invisibly. Food poverty means many mothers reduce their food intake to ensure their children are properly fed. A 2023 Action Aid report found that period poverty increased by almost 20% in the year before.

One of the more visible aspects of widespread poverty in the UK today is homelessness. Women, for their own safety, are once again largely invisible. Government statistics report that women make up around 15% of rough sleepers nationwide. The first national women’s rough sleeping census held by Solace Women’s Aid in 2023 found that “In the 41 local areas that took part in the Census, 815 women were identified compared to just 189 through the Government’s Rough Sleeping Census.”

Off the streets, women make up over 60% of homeless adults in temporary accommodation, with this number having doubled in the past decade. Poor, unsuitable and precarious housing options for women add to the silent suffering, and often prevent women, with or without children, leaving abusive relationships and domestic violence.

A further invisible impact is on women’s health. Austerity measures have seen life expectancy fall over the past decade. The disparity in the life expectancy of the average woman and women living in poverty is almost one decade. For women experiencing sleeping rough, a life expectancy of 43 is almost half that of the average woman.

These are not just statistics but the everyday precarious living conditions and inequality experienced by millions of women across the UK. Poverty is not the result of the poor lifestyle choices of individuals but of deliberate punitive choices made by politicians.

There is much to be done to reverse growing gender inequality and the regression of women’s rights due to poverty. The current Labour government has failed thus far to take positive action, such as scrapping the two-child limit for universal credit support and addressing the detriment to millions of women affected by the rise in pension age.

Just some of the many steps that need to be taken immediately to address poverty and its impact on women’s rights in the UK include rethinking cuts to council budgets that force the burden of social care onto women as unpaid care work, increasing funding for women’s organisations who understand the particular challenges all kinds of women face, and public investment in childcare, making it affordable to allow women to access their rights and participate more fully and equally in society.

Aisha Maniar is a human rights activist.

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End gender pension and pay gap so millions won’t retire as poor as their grandmothers

HubMP2012

MARCH 7, 2025

The National Pensioners Convention is calling for an end to the iniquitous gender pension gap which leaves many women pensioners in poverty.

Ahead of International Women’s Day, the NPC is also calling for a bridging of the gender pay gap to allow today’s female workers to earn enough to afford higher pension contributions and avoid falling into the poverty trap like their grandmothers.

More than one in five women pensioners in the UK are estimated to live in poverty compared to one in four men, and the figure is higher among single women.  Those, particularly older women who live alone, make up the biggest proportion of the two million pensioners currently living in poverty in the UK. 

Research by the Pension Policy Institute (PPI) for their 2024 Gender Pensions Gap Report found women on average retire with pension savings of £69,000, compared to £205,000 for men. The report concluded: “In order to close this gap, a girl would need to start pension saving at just three years old.”

Jan Shortt, NPC General Secretary, said: “The theme of International Women’s Day on 8th March is a call to ‘Accelerate Action’ on gender equality. That’s why the NPC will be writing to the Ministers for Women and Equalities and the Department for Work and Pensions – Bridget Phillipson MP and Liz Kendall MP – urging them to end the iniquitous pensions gap that means millions of particularly older and vulnerable women are living in poverty.

“Most people do not understand our two-tier state pension system which means more than two thirds of our 12.5 million pensioners – those who retired before 2016 – receive much lower pensions than the new state pension figures often quoted in the press.”

The gap is largely due to older women in their late 70s, 80s and 90s who retired before 2016 having much lower state pensions, and occupational pensions because they took time out of work for family responsibilities.  And they might not have been able to pay enough National Insurance to ensure that they even receive the basic/old rate.

Jan Shortt added: “The NPC is campaigning for everyone who retires – no matter their age, gender or contributions – to receive the same basic state pension, set at 70% of the living wage and above the official poverty level.

“No one should be penalised because of their circumstances from having a decent quality of life in retirement – and this starts with a decent income.  But striving to bridge the gender pay gap to allow more women to afford higher personal pension contributions is equally important, and something any decent society should be committee to.”

 The “NPC is also advocating for the WASPI women to receive the compensation the Ombudsman recommended and not be ignored by the government. Rightly, successive governments wanted to equalise the retirement age for men and women – but the way it was done for those ‘50s born WASPI women is grossly unfair.”

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