China's largest shipping company and the captain of a ship leaking oil in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park should face the full force of the law, Anna Bligh says.
The Queensland premier says there appear to have been some blatant breaches of Australia's shipping laws and if that's proven, serious penalties will apply.
Authorities say the vessel remains stuck on Douglas Shoal, 70km east of Great Keppel Island, and could break up, causing a major environmental disaster.
Ms Bligh hopes a major oil spill can be averted and the ship salvaged but, she says, the process could take weeks and will be incredibly difficult.
Cosco Group, China's largest shipping company and the owner of the leaking Shen Neng 1, could be fined $1 million, and the ship's captain $220,000.
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Ms Bligh said the ship should never have been in the restricted area where it hit the shoal on Saturday, and was 15km from the nearest designated shipping channel.
She said Commonwealth authorities could lay charges against the ship's owner and captain.
"Frankly, I think the book should be thrown at this organisation. This is a very delicate part of one of the most precious marine environments on earth," she told the ABC on Monday morning.
"There are safe, authorised shipping channels and that's where this ship should have been."
Ms Bligh said experts had advised her the salvage operation could take "some weeks". "It's possible that this could be one of the most complex and difficult salvage operations we've seen, certainly in Queensland maritime history and possibly Australia's," she said.
"It's in such a delicate part of the reef, and the ship is in such a badly damaged state that managing this process will require all the specialist expertise we can bring to bear."
She said a Commonwealth investigation was underway to determine why the ship, which is carrying 975 tonnes of heavy fuel oil and 65,000 tonnes of coal, was so far off course.
She said the grounding, on Douglas Shoal 70km east of Great Keppel Island, was an usual event, with some 6,000 ships safety navigating Queensland's designated shipping lanes each year.
She said the amount of traffic off the Queensland coast was only going to increase as resource-based projects went ahead.
For that reason, maritime authorities have been working on a risk analysis looking at issues such as mandatory pilots aboard cargo and freight vessels.
That analysis was not yet complete, Ms Bligh said, but the latest grounding would bring that issue into sharp focus.
Earlier, Ms Bligh told the Nine Network that any major oil spill would see tonnes of oil awash in the marine park.
It would also likely reach the beaches of Shoalwater Bay, which is a national park area.
