Worst Damage Yet on Beaches : Winds Push Thick Crude Oil Ashore

Strong winds overnight produced the worst damage yet to Orange County beaches, driving heavy bands of thick crude oil that spilled offshore last week onto the sands of Huntington and Bolsa Chica state beaches.

Coast Guard officials monitoring the oil slick said bands 20 to 30 feet wide and 2 inches thick washed ashore at Bolsa Chica State Beach early today. Smaller fingers of the slick also stained areas of Huntington Beach, and city officials there said the goo included thick balls of oil that resembled tar.

The Coast Guard also reported shortly after noon today that drug tests were negative on the tanker’s captain, Robert La Ware, the mooring pilot, John Keon, and the ship’s second mate, who was on watch at the time of the accident. Earlier tests for alcohol were also negative.

The latest threat from the slick comes despite significant progress in the cleanup of the oil, which spewed from the American Trader, an 80,000-ton tanker that ruptured an oil-bearing compartment Wednesday, apparently when it collided with its own anchor. Sunday, the Coast Guard reported that two-thirds of the 394,000 gallons of oil spilled by the tanker either had been cleaned up or had naturally dispersed.

After an early meeting between Coast Guard and shipping company officials, Petty Officer Tim Rowe said the Coast Guard is now satisfied that the tanker is patched and the compartment that ruptured is clean. A final decision on moving the vessel to Long Beach, however, was delayed until after the group could inspect the tanker’s hull for possible contamination by oil in the water. Inspection and further cleanup could delay American Trader’s departure until tomorrow, officials said.

With heavy oil coming ashore, Huntington Beach and state officials ordered city and state beaches closed for a minimum of three weeks. Closure, they said, will aid cleanup and bird rescue efforts.

“Today could be the worst day yet for wildlife,” Curt Taucher, a spokesman for the state Department of Fish and Game said this morning. By late morning, 160 oil-coated birds were being treated at two makeshift centers in Huntington Beach and Terminal Island. Another 63 have died.

Veterinarians issued pleas for sheets and towels to be brought to the bird center at Magnolia Street and Pacific Coast Highway for cleaning and covering the oily fowl.

But after nightfall Sunday, offshore breezes that had been holding the remaining oil out to sea subsided and were replaced by a strong onshore wind.

For several hours, winds of close to 20 m.p.h. blew oil onto a 3.5-mile stretch of coastline north of the Huntington Beach pier. Winds and evaporation have combined to turn some of the crude oil washing ashore into a mousse-like thick, heavy substance.

The oil washing ashore today was described by some observers as having the consistency of paint, and fumes were so heavy that about a dozen workers became ill with headaches and nausea, forcing suspension of the cleanup for several hours.

Once the cleanup resumed early today, British Petroleum America, which owned the oil aboard the American Trader, dispatched more than 400 cleanup workers to swab the affected beaches.