Striper Talk Striped Bass Fishing, Surfcasting, Boating - Buzzards Bay spill was 98K gallons instead of 14K

http://www.turnto10.com/news/2216064/detail.html

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Recovery Costs Exceed $18 Million

POSTED: 12:09 p.m. EDT May 20, 2003
UPDATED: 5:59 p.m. EDT May 20, 2003

An oil spill in Buzzards Bay that killed hundreds of birds and shut down the local shellfishing industry was almost seven times larger than originally reported, totaling nearly 100,000 gallons, the Coast Guard said Tuesday.

The April 27 spill was about 98,000 gallons, not the 14,700 gallons first reported by Bouchard Transportation Inc., which owned the barge that leaked the oil.

"It takes it from being a little spill to being a more significant one," said Malcolm Spaulding, an oil spill specialist at the University of Rhode Island.

Mark Rasmussen of the Coalition for Buzzards Bay, a citizens group, said Bouchard's failure to quickly release accurate information was "negligence."

"The Bouchard company has taken something from this region and this is another insult from that company," Rasmussen said.

News Channel 10's Larry Estepa reported Fairhaven Selectman Will Eckenreiter blames Bouchard for not starting cleanup efforts sooner. The selectman also raised the possibility of criminal charges against the company.

"They shouldn't be able to just walk away and write it off a business expense," Eckenreiter said. "Someone's responsible for the lack of information, the lack of notification to local officials. And they're the ones who were in control."

The Coast Guard will investigate the underestimate as part of its probe into the spill, said Lt. Dean Jones, a Coast Guard spokesman.

"The difference is significant, and we want to know why it's significant," he said.

Bouchard reported the new number to the Coast Guard Monday night, Jones said, adding he did not know what prompted the disclosure. A Bouchard spokeswoman did not have an immediate comment when reached Tuesday by The Associated Press.

Jones said the low estimate had no effect on cleanup because the Coast Guard responded to the spill as if the entire 4.1 million gallons on board the barge was at risk.

"We're not looking for 14,000 gallons," he said. "We're looking for oil and we're going to clean up what we find."

Coast Guard Capt. Mary Landry, who is coordinating the cleanup, said the revision left her frustrated. But she said the cleanup costs -- $18.5 million so far -- were projected to be the highest per-gallon costs in history.

"(The new number) absolutely made more sense," she said.

Long Island-based Bouchard has accepted full responsibility for the cleanup and there is no penalty for the bad estimate, Jones said.

The new estimate makes the spill the third-worst in the history of Buzzards Bay, behind a 185,000 gallon spill in 1969 and a 165,000 gallon spill in 1974.

More than 370 birds were found dead or have died since the spill, which affected 53 miles of coastline. The spill also shut down the regional shellfishing industry, which has about $4 million in annual revenues and employs about 200 people full-time.

Mike Hickey, the state's chief shellfish biologist, said the new numbers likely won't cause further delays in reopening the beds because officials had assumed the first estimate was too low. He declined to predict when the fishermen would be back in business after expressing optimism earlier this month that the reopening was imminent.

"We're not doing anything until we're sure there's no health risk at all and there's no tainted shellfish," he said.

Bouchard's initial spill estimate came the night its barge began leaking oil from a gash in the hull, which officials say was likely caused when the barge hit an underwater ledge. The investigation is continuing, and the crew tested negative for drugs.

The rush of water that likely flooded the damaged tank probably mixed with the oil inside, making the tank appear more full than it was, Jones said. That mix may also have affected readings taken on the barge at a Sandwich fuel terminal later that week, he said.

Cleanup crews have recovered almost 4,600 cubic yards of oily, solid waste and skimmed 3,500 gallons of oil from the bay's surface, Jones said.

Spaulding said he began to suspect the spill was much larger because the cleanup seemed to be going too well. Oil recovery from spills is generally between 5 and 15 percent, but the Buzzards Bay recovery was nearing 24 percent. The new number has on-water recovery at about 4 percent

"I don't call this a success," Landry said, adding that weather hampered early recovery efforts.

But U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy praised the Coast Guard's efforts, saying in a statement that the new estimate increases his frustration with Bouchard and "undermines their credibility during the cleanup process."