LOCAL : Cleanup Crews Focus on Rocky Jetties on Oil-Damaged Shore
As work crews continued to sift the sands along the Orange County coast for oil that spilled from a punctured tanker two weeks ago, efforts began in earnest today to cleanse rocky jetties stained by the crude.
Armed with equipment shipped in from Alaska where it had been used on the Exxon Valdez spill, workers began using a warm rinse of seawater to wash down rocky stretches of shoreline on Newport Beach and Bolsa Chica State Beach.
Officials with British Petroleum, the firm that owned the 394,000 gallons of crude that spilled Feb. 7 from the tanker American Trader, increased the number of workers deployed on the beach for the second straight day in an effort to speed the cleanup and defuse criticism from local city officials who suggested the operation was being wound down prematurely.
About 350 people participated in the cleanup this morning, compared to 320 on Tuesday and 200 on Monday.
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