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Rain Creates 2-Acre Oil Slick at Cleanup Site of Closed Refinery

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Rain from recent storms soaked into the petroleum-saturated earth of a defunct refinery in Canyon Country and floated up an oil slick almost two acres in size, a state health official said Friday.

Workers from the state Department of Health Services on Friday had almost finished cleaning up the slick at Lubrication Co. of America, where the state was already carrying out a $1-million cleanup of hazardous substances in the soil before the rains began, said Richard Varenchik, a spokesman for the department.

The slick on a five-acre site east of the Antelope Valley Freeway looked like “a large swimming pool” filled with rainwater and oil, but protective dikes confined the slick to the site, Varenchik said.

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He said the refinery soil is soaked with oil and other petroleum products from fuel spills. The estimated 2 1/2 inches of rain in the past week saturated the soil and caused the oil, which is lighter than water, to float to the surface.

Varenchik said workers used absorbent rags called diapers to mop up and then removed the remainder with suction hoses.

The refinery operated from 1960 until early last year, officials said. The facility recycled and stored waste oil and fuels, such as those pumped from decommissioned U.S. Navy ships in San Diego. A state report concluded that surface runoff from previous spills was carried by a ditch to the dry bed of the Santa Clara River.

Even before the rains, authorities had been testing soil samples to determine the extent of contamination at the site and on surrounding property, Varenchik said.

Money for the cleanup came from a 1984 bond issue that raised funds for a statewide cleanup of hazardous substances.

Under an agreement with Grant Ivey, owner of Lubrication Co. of America, the property will be sold and the state will be reimbursed for cleanup costs of up to $1.4 million, officialssaid.

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