13 November 2003 – ITS 37-day journey across the Atlantic was dogged by controversy and uncertainty. The same mood was in evidence yesterday when the first of four former United States navy toxic "ghost ships" docked on Teeside amid protests and calls for a public inquiry.

Protesters lined the quay at Hartlepool dock as the 58-year-old Caloosahatchee oil tanker tied up under a gunmetal grey sky.

The rusting oil tanker's 4589-mile journey from the James River Naval Reserve base in Virginia at an average speed of 7mph was accompanied by a host of legal and environmental rows.

It was one of 13 rusting former US navy ships which Able UK, the Hartlepool-based company, had won a £16m contract to dismantle.

Nine of the vessels were blocked from sailing last month in an 11th-hour US court ruling, pending the result of legal moves by environmental groups.

The Caloosahatchee sailed via the English Channel after Scottish authorities objected to the ships entering its coastal waters, fearing that this and any future convoys would threaten sensitive marine environments that are difficult to navigate, such as the Pentland Firth.

The government has said the Caloosahatchee, and a sister ship, the Canisteo, which is scheduled to arrive today, can be temporarily stored on Teeside, but should be sent back to the US. Two other ships are expected to arrive in the next week.

Local people have expressed concern that Hartlepool would be used as a dumping ground for US waste, and fear pollution could wreck the north-east coastline if a vessel is damaged in transit.

Peter Mandelson, Labour MP for Hartlepool, has accused groups like Friends of the Earth of "scaremongering" over the arrangement. He said the town's port was an appropriate destination for the ships and said there was "absolutely no reason why this waste recovery and recycling should not continue".

His views contrasted starkly with town councillors who voted unanimously to lobby Alistair Darling, the transport secretary, to reroute the ships.

Peter Stephenson, managing director of Able, said his company stood to lose a £3.4m bond if the work could not be completed. He said further contracts worth hundreds of millions of pounds, which depended on the dry dock that would be built to carry out the work, were also at stake.

The so-called "ghost fleet" ships have been dogged by controversy since setting off from Virginia on October 6.

The Environment Agency only granted permission on Tuesday for the first two to dock under stringent conditions that "no dismantling, cutting or breaking" would be permitted and the agency would be allowed to conduct daily checks on them.

In a separate move, a High Court judge ruled no work could be carried out on any of the four vessels until legal challenges by Friends of the Earth and residents living near the Able site had been heard.

Margaret Beckett, the environment secretary, has said that, under international law, the four ships should not have come to Britain and were only being allowed to stay here for storage as it would be "impracticable" for them to be returned to the US over the winter. Discussions are currently underway with US authorities about sending back the other two ships, the Canopus and the Compass Island.

The ghost fleet ships were built between 40 and 60 years ago in an era when the use of PCBs, lead paint and asbestos was commonplace. The entire fleet of some 130 vessels is contaminated with the chemicals.

The US Maritime Administration (Marad) arranged for the four ships to leave the US for Britain after a federal judge ruled on October 2 that two US environmental groups did not have sufficient grounds for a restraining order to halt the sailing.

But the judge blocked the US government from moving nine of 13 ships to Britain because Marad had not carried out environmental studies as required by federal law.

Tony Juniper, executive director of Friends of the Earth, said the deal to send US ships abroad for dismantling had set a precedent. He expressed fears that more vessels would be sent to developing countries for breaking up, and added: "The government must hold an urgent public inquiry to establish how this situation has arisen."