Spilled Oil Caught as Truck
Salvaged
By Judith Lavoie
Excerpted from the
A specially
designed metal
jacket wrapped around a
fuel truck that has sat on the
ocean floor for almost two years
in an environmentally sensitive
area is believed to have captured
almost all of the oil that spilled
as the truck was lifted this week.
“It was entirely anticipated
that would happen and that’s
why the jacket was there,” said
Randy Alexander, environmental
protection manager for the
Environment Ministry.
Oil is lighter than water, so it
floated to the top of the deepwater-
recovery container belonging
to Netherlands-based Momoet
Salvage B.V., which conducted the
salvage of the tanker truck and a
metal cube containing barrels of
hydraulic oil.
They are among 11 pieces of
equipment that slipped off a barge
into Robson Bight Ecological
Reserve in August 2007.
The container, fuel truck and
oil cube were returned to New
of oil that escaped into the
jacket will be assessed. The fuel
and hydraulic oil will then be
pumped into a vacuum truck
and recycled.
The day before the recovery,
when the truck wheels were
pulled out of the mud 350
metres below the surface, a
small amount of oil leaked out,
but most was caught by booms
and absorbent mats. “It was a
burp of a couple of litres and it
was collected on the surface,”
Alexander said.
But it was a scary moment for
observers who saw fuel rise to
the surface and wondered if the
tanker, carrying up to 10,000
litres of diesel, had ruptured,
said Oonagh O’Connor of the
Living Oceans Society.
It’s now believed the fuel
might have come from the
truck’s fuel tanks, she said. “If
that’s the only incident, that’s
amazing.”
Living Oceans is asking
Transport
changes to make barge traffic
safer, and for an immediate halt
to commercial shipping through
the fragile ecological reserve,
said O’Connor, adding barge
cargo should be tied down. “We
have 100,000 barge movements
on the B.C. coast each year and
no requirement for tying down.
You get substances like barrels
of hydrochloric acid just sitting
on barges.”
Living Oceans also wants
mandatory inspections of barges
to ensure they are seaworthy.
The recovery inadvertently
offered a window into the
workings of the provincial
government’s Public Affairs
Bureau when a news release
included an e-mail between two
communications staffers.
“Think the background info
should be simplified and not
mention the leak of some oil —
raises new questions. Should
just offer the basics — how it
was lifted, that it was successful
and next steps. Not budget
either — they can call about
those details if they chose (sic),”
it says.
Environment Ministry spokeswoman
Kate Thompson said the
inclusion of the e-mail was
inadvertent, but none of the
information was secret.
The budget for the recovery
operation was set at $2.5 million,
but will probably come in
at about $2 million, she said.
Government is still hoping to
recoup some of the operation’s
cost from Ted LeRoy Trucking of
Chemainus, which owns the
equipment, but the company
has declared bankruptcy.
Charges have been laid
against LeRoy Trucking and
Gowlland Towing of
River.
Paul Cottrell, the DFO acting
marine mammal coordinator was in
Robson Bight ensuring there were
no whales around as salvage crews
recovered the sunken fuel truck.
Coincidentally, a humpback whale
in distress was reported just 45
minutes away.