Moscow -
More than 30,000 birds have died along the Russian coastline following an oil and sulphur spill in the Black Sea. "The damage is so great that it cannot be estimated. This amounts to an ecological disaster," Alexander Tkatschov, the governor of the affected southern territory of Krasnodar, was quoted as saying Monday by the Interfax news agency.San Francisco -
President Vladimir Putin would fly to the area immediately, government chief Viktor Subkov said.
The oil spill occurred when a severe storm in the Black Sea caused tankers and cargo ships to break apart on Sunday, spilling thousands of tons of fuel and sulphur.
Hundreds of workers attempted to save wildlife and halt the spread of a large oil spill in the San Francisco Bay that has continued to spread and led to the closing of many beaches on the US West Coast. More than 200 birds have been buried alive in oil and 60 have already died, radio broadcaster KCBS reported late Saturday. More than 220,00 litres of oil have leaked into the bay since Wednesday after a huge container ship slammed into the Bay Bridge.
Only 75,000 litres of oil has been cleaned up so far, and 13 kilometres of floating barriers had been deployed to halt the spread.
Sixty boats, including 20 special craft to remove oil from the water, were involved in the more than 500-man cleanup effort, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Update 12/9: And now, South Korea:
Seoul - A Hong-Kong registered supertanker that collided with a barge spilt an estimated 10,500 tons of oil into the Yellow Sea off the coast of South Korea Friday, according to the Maritime Ministry. The Hebei Spirit was eight kilometres north-west of the Taean peninsula, 110 kilometres south-west of Seoul, waiting to enter port when it was rammed by an unmanned barge carrying a crane.
The crane punched three holes into the tanker that had a cargo of 260,000 tons of crude oil. The barge had loosened itself from a tug in stormy weather.
More than 30 ships and helicopters have been deployed to prevent a larger oil spill amid fears that the leak could reach the coast by Saturday.
2 comments:
They won't get away with covering this one up with some slick presentation... um, I mean...
The public became aware of the hazards of transporting oil in tankers some decades ago in the Exxon Valdez spill. As far as I can tell, while better cleanup techniques have been developed, I can't remember noting any advances in addressing the fundamental problem. Human operators being imperfect, we will see this event repeated indefinitely into the future until we switch to another primary energy source.
Brazil just discovered a really deep oil reserve off their coast. And they were doing so well on sugar cane...
Yes. We need another primary energy source. Now. Because all oil does is make greedy oil men greedier, threaten and destroy environments and wildlife, and make wars where innocents die horribly.
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