On July 23, 2006, the 654-foot container ship Cougar Ace was transporting over 4,800 automobiles from Japan to Vancouver, Canada. For an unknown reason, it began to take on water about 245 nautical miles southwest of Atka, Alaska, and started to list to its port side. A sheen was reported about two miles in length, emanating from the vessel. The crew of 23 was rescued by U.S. Coast Guard and National Guard helicopters.

After floating around in the North Pacific Ocean for over a week, a tug from Seattle finally arrived and towed the vessel to Unalaska Harbor, Alaska, where the vessel was re-ballasted to a normal upright position. Spill specialists from OR&R's Emergency Response Division aided responders with drift trajectories of the vessel in order to guide the responding tug to the location of the drifting ship, and helped create contingency plans, in the event that the vessel began discharging more fuel. No additional pollution occurred.