Tanks Leak 19,000 Gallons of Fuel at Montana Sect’s Fallout Shelters

Workers on Sunday began pumping out tanks near Yellowstone National Park that leaked up to 19,000 gallons of fuel from fallout shelters constructed by an apocalyptic sect.

“They’ve got a serious situation up there right now,” said Steve Pilcher, chief of Montana’s Water Quality Bureau. “ . . . They’re looking at a long-term recovery and cleanup effort.”

The 35 tanks, with a capacity of 634,500 gallons of diesel fuel and gasoline, were installed last winter in the Church Universal and Triumphant’s underground complex. The shelters are on a ranch the sect purchased in 1981 from Forbes publisher Malcolm Forbes to prepare for a nuclear catastrophe.

Church officials reported last week that one tank containing diesel fuel had leaked 4,000 gallons into the ground. Two others were reported leaking over the weekend.

Pilcher, who visited the site Saturday, said 15,000 gallons were unaccounted for Sunday, and most likely were in the soil near the complex.

The tanks and the 750-person shelter complex are within a few hundred yards of Mol Heron Creek, an important cutthroat trout spawning stream that runs into the Yellowstone River, one of the nation’s premier fly-fishing areas.

By Saturday night, church officials had decided that all 35 tanks must be pumped out, excavated and inspected, said Murray Steinman, a sect spokesman.