Nervous Watch Kept on Oil Slick Near Sanctuary

The Coast Guard spent a nervous day Thursday monitoring a 20-mile-long oil slick from a sunken freighter as it drifted in the vicinity of a marine sanctuary at San Miguel Island.

Early Thursday, 25-m.p.h. winds pushed the slick directly toward the island, which is about 35 miles southwest of Santa Barbara, Coast Guard spokesman Charles Crosby said. But the winds changed late in the day, and it appeared as if the slick would bypass San Miguel.

“But things can change very quickly out there,” Crosby said. “The danger has not passed.”

San Miguel, part of the five-island Channel Islands National Park, is home to about 10,000 seals and sea lions, 11 species of birds--including two on the federal endangered species list--and hundreds of pristine tide pools, said Bill Ehorn, park superintendent. Northern fur seals on the island have just finished their breeding season, and an oil slick could be extremely dangerous to the offspring, he added.

The National Park Service placed five marine biologists on the 10,000-acre island Thursday to monitor conditions, Ehorn said. If oil washes ashore, National Park Service personnel will be dispatched to the island to wash oil from birds and mammals and attempt to clean the beaches.

“Oil is dangerous for both birds and marine mammals,” said Bud Laurent, a California Department of Fish and Game marine biologist. “It interferes with their insulating capabilities, and they can die of hypothermia. If they ingest any oil while cleaning themselves, they can become sick. There are a lot of potential problems.”

If the island appeared in imminent danger of pollution, the Coast Guard could air drop chemical “dispersants” in an attempt to stop the flow of the slick, Crosby said.

Dispersants “break up the oil into small particles and cause it to sink,” said Rolf Mall, a program manager for the Department of Fish and Game, which is assisting the Coast Guard in controlling the spill. But the dispersants are also toxic, he said, and can cause environmental damage themselves.

“It’s a matter of trade-offs,” he said. “With the dispersants you’re introducing another toxic substance into the environment. And they could mix with the oil to create an even more toxic substance. But if you don’t use them, something even worse could happen. That’s what we’re struggling with right now.”

The freighter the Pac Baroness, a Liberian bulk carrier, collided with a car-carrying ship early Monday and sank 11 hours later. It had about 386,000 gallons of fuel aboard when it sank.

Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Assns., said the oil slick has temporarily placed a prime fishing area off limits to fishermen. Grader said that in an effort to avoid repetition of the incident, he will request Congress to ask the International Maritime Organization to restrict large ships traveling through the area.

Grader said he hoped that the organization, which governs international merchant shipping, would force large ships to avoid traveling near the coast and move 20 to 30 miles from land.

“These are very productive fishing areas, and the huge ships continue to run through them,” Grader said. “It’s like putting an interstate in the middle of rich farmland.”

The oil slick has expanded during the last two days because of high winds and the continued seepage from the freighter, which sank about 10 1/2 miles southwest of Point Conception. The winds and eight-foot waves halted all efforts to clean up the slick.