The legal challenge against leaving the wreck of the boxship Rena on Astrolabe Reef in New Zealand has been dismissed.
High court judge Gerard van Bohemen halted the appeal four days before it was due to be heard in Tauranga, the New Zealand Herald reported.
He granted an application by the Astrolabe Community Trust to dismiss an action by Maori community group Ngai Te Hapu against decisions by the environment court in 2017 to allow the abandonment of the wreck.
The trust was set up by shipowner Costamare and insurer Swedish Club to seek abandonment consent.
The 3,032-teu containership (built 1990) ran aground in 2011.
Van Bohemen said Ngai Te Hapu had failed to provide security for costs as ordered by the high court on 11 April.
He added there was "no realistic prospect of the appeal succeeding."
Ngai Te Hapu spokesman Buddy Mikaere said it was looking to appeal the decision.
Mikaere said Ngai Te Hapu saw the wreck as having a spiritual impact on the hapu but this had not been reflected in the consent conditions agreed to by the environment court.
"Insurance consternation"
TradeWinds reported last year that the environmental court ruling had pointed to the bill for the salvage and wreck removal escalating by at least $200m, causing consternation in the marine reinsurance market.
A key judgment put the cost of tackling the wrecked vessel at the huge figure of NZD 900m ($650m), much higher than the current loss notification to protection-and-indemnity (P&I) club reinsurers.
The Rena had P&I and hull cover from the Swedish Club. Under the collaborative arrangements of the International Group, claims are first pooled and then laid off under a huge $3bn programme to reinsurers at Lloyd’s and around the world.
The International Group had notified reinsurers that the total incurred cost of the Rena was $430m, with the overall estimate remaining at $450m.
