473,000 Gallons of crude oil - not 30,000!!!
November 30, 2004 — The Coast Guard said Tuesday that more than 473,000 gallons of crude oil is missing from the tanker Athos I, and investigators now believe that significantly more oil was spilled into the Delaware than the 30,000 gallons initially reported.
Authorities aren't able to accurately say yet how big Friday's spill was, but now believe that the total was "significantly higher" than 30,000 gallons, Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Patrick Montgomery said.
The initial estimate might have been inaccurate because it was based on a reading taken while the ship was listing 4 or 5 degrees to the side, Montgomery said.
Coast Guard Lt. Buddy Dye said investigators need to test an oil-water mixture in a ballast tank before they can accurately determine how much crude leaked from the tanker.
"But until we can get it all off-loaded and separated, we won't have a good figure," Dye said.
He said 473,500 gallons are unaccounted for, but called a leak of that size a "worst case scenario." The worst oil spill in the Delaware's history occurred in 1989, when a tanker ran aground near Claymont, Del., spilling 300,000 gallons of heating oil into the river.
Dye said the process of examining the mixture in the ballast tank could take four or five days. The Coast Guard said the cause of the rupture still was unclear. "This is a complete mystery to us," Montgomery said. "We have people scratching our heads."
As the oil sheen created by the spill continued spreading up and down the river, New Jersey's two senators said they would push for a law compelling owners of similar tankers to switch to more secure vessels.
After flying over and then boating through parts of the 40-mile long section of the Delaware affected by the spill, U.S. Sens. Jon Corzine and Frank Lautenberg said they would introduce a bill to increase the liability for ship owners in case of a leak.
A tablespoon of oil can create up to a football field of sheen," Campbell said. Campbell said the oil was within three miles of a drinking-water intake in Delran and about a dozen miles from the nuclear power facility in Salem _ close enough that officials have asked the companies that run those utilities to take extra precautions.
The effects of the spill are not just environmental, but also economic. The Philadelphia region is among the nation's largest port areas.
