The 225m long Pasha Bulker was one of 10 vessels (of the 58 anchored off Newcastle awaiting access to bulk coal loading facilities) who defied requests to move to sea by Port Authorities in the serious 1 in 30 year storm of June 7th-8th 2007.She finally dropped her ballast water and attemted to head to sea,to no avail,being washed up on Nobbys Beach just near the harbour entrance.There was great concern for the likely environmental impacts of an unsuccessful salvage but on July 2nd 2007 salvage tugs were,with the aid of on deck winches and sea anchors,able to drag her free,fortunately with minimal environmental impact.
Greenpeace saw an opportunity to promote the case that coal causes global warming by projecting a large slogan to that effect across the ships bows with lasers.