'Ghost Ships' May Move To Scotland

Concern is mounting after it emerged that controversial "ghost ships" could be moved from Teesside to a disused Highland oil yard. The company which brought decaying vessels containing toxic material from the US have confirmed they're bidding for the Nigg facility. The move has caused alarm among environmentalists. The future of Nigg in Easter Ross is once again in the spotlight with the possibility that so called toxic ghost ships could be broken up at the former oil rig yard. Today Teesside firm Able UK, which won a contract in 2003 to tow 13 American naval reserve ships to the Britain for demolition, confirmed its bid for Nigg. The company hope to build a twenty-five million pounds facility in Hartlepool, but four sixty year old ships, allegedly polluted with eight hundred tonnes of asbestos and cancer-causing chemicals, are tied up in Teesside amid a wrangle with environmental bodies over the plans. Now the proposed Nigg buy-out's been met with opposition from local politicians and residents. A spokesman for Friends of the Earth said Able, and all the other bidders, should make public their full intentions for the site and whether they include the scrapping of contaminated ships from abroad. No-one from Nigg's owner company KBR Caledonia was available for comment.The ships are currently laid up on Teeside