The UN has warned it could cost billions if an oil tanker abandoned off the coast of Yemen breaks up.
UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen David Gressly warned Monday that a recent visit with technical experts aboard the FSO Safer indicated "the ship is about to break up".
Cleaning up the impending oil spill could cost $20 billion.
The 45-year-old floating oil tanker "Safer" has long been used as a floating oil storage facility with 1.1 million barrels of crude oil on board.
The ship has been lying in front of the rebel-controlled Yemeni port of Hodeida since 2015 without being serviced.
"The effects of a leak would be catastrophic," Gressly warned.
According to the UN representative, the Netherlands wants to hold a donor conference on Wednesday to avert the crisis.
According to an estimate last month, the UN needs $80 million for this.
This is intended to pump the oil from the "Safer" to a replacement ship.
However, this is only for securing the cargo, stressed Gressly, who estimated that the securing work would require a total of $144 million.
chaos of war
War has been raging in Yemen since 2015 between government troops backed by Arab states and Shiite Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
The rebels occupied the Yemeni capital Sanaa in 2014 and now control most of northern Yemen.
According to the UN, around 380,000 people have already died as a result of the conflict, most of them from hunger, disease and a lack of drinking water.
Millions more people had to flee.
The UN considers the crisis in Yemen to be the largest humanitarian catastrophe in the world.