A year ago today, a cargo ship capsized in St. Simons Sound. Part of it still remains there

Tuesday marks one year since a cargo ship capsized off the coast of St. Simons Island and trapped crew members inside the ship.

The Golden Ray rolled on its side the morning of Sept. 8, 2019 as it was leaving Brunswick bound for Baltimore. The ship had been transporting 4,200 vehicles at the time of the accident.

A pilot and 23 crew members were on board and nearly all of them escaped that Sunday. However, four crew members became trapped inside the ship.

The search and rescue operations took almost 36 hours to complete before all four members were safely rescued that Monday afternoon on Sept. 9.

Channel 2 Action News livestreamed the rescue efforts on our website and news app.

Now one year later, parts of the Golden Ray still sit in St. Simons Sound. Removal operations have been ongoing but delayed in recent months due to weather and COVID-19.

Meanwhile, neighbors in St. Simons have been worried about the environmental concerns and with hurricane season in effect.

“We thought, what is the worst that can happen? The worst would be that the ship could leak oil, that it would still be there during hurricane season, that they will cut it vertically and the ship will fall apart in the sound,” Megan Desrosiers, president and CEO of One Hundred Miles, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Nedra Rhone. “All of those things are what it is coming to be.”

Read more about the ongoing removal process and the problems reported by Channel 2′s partners at AJC.com.

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Georgia Ports Authority spokesman Robert Morris said an incident like this is the first of its kind for a vessel at either the Brunswick or Savannah ports.

Cox Media Group