Ship Blows Stack, Soils Seal Beach Shoreline, Homes : Accident: Two-inch layer of silt settles in, forcing beach closure. Homeowners’ walls, carpets, furniture--even their skin--are blackened.

A half-mile stretch of beach was closed Tuesday after a freighter anchored off Long Beach “blew its stacks,” spewing carbon soot that blackened the shoreline and soiled the interiors of about 40 oceanfront homes Monday night.

By Tuesday afternoon, most of the black silt that washed ashore south of Seal Beach Pier had been shoveled up by a team of 100 cleanup workers. But homeowners along Seal Way and Ocean Avenue remained upset by the oily film that stained their flower gardens, walls, carpets, furniture--even their skin.

One woman said that she fell asleep on her living room couch and that when she awoke at 3 a.m. she looked in a bathroom mirror and saw half her face covered with soot that had blown in an open window.

“I looked at my face and it was all black here,” said Betty Moore, 69, pointing to her left cheek. “I came out and looked at my furniture and everything was covered with it. I called to my husband, ‘Honey, look what’s happened to our house!’ ”

The ship’s operator, Hapag-Lloyd, a German freight company with a Long Beach office, accepted responsibility for the incident and hired the cleanup teams. The company’s insurers immediately agreed to pay documented claims from homeowners.

Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Mark Lewack said the vessel, the Canada Express, which was anchored in Los Angeles and Long Beach harbors about 5 miles offshore, “blew its stacks,” or vented its smokestacks, at about 2:30 a.m. Monday.

The venting loosened the carbon material inside, “and the soot went poof, like in a chimney,” Lewack said.

Although venting is a routine and legal practice for ships, the large amount of carbon soot was unusual, and it apparently was caused by a malfunction of a valve in the smokestacks, officials said.

By Monday evening, a large, wet mass of the powdery material washed ashore near the pier. The layer of soot, which was about 2 inches thick, stained a wide strip of beach between the city’s pier and the jetties at Anaheim Bay, Coast Guard officials said.

Working overnight Monday, about 40 workers from a Long Beach environmental cleanup company donned yellow protective clothing and scooped up patches of sand with shovels. The material was dumped into plastic bags to be hauled to a toxic waste disposal site. The team was relieved at 6 a.m. Tuesday by 60 others, who worked throughout the day.

The beach and ocean waters south of Seal Beach Pier were closed Tuesday to swimmers and surfers as a precaution and to hasten the cleanup. The beach is expected to reopen today.

“It was a mess out there,” said Gwen Forsythe, a Seal Beach city councilwoman who was pleased with the speed of the cleanup. “When I saw it, I immediately thought of ‘Mary Poppins,’ with the chimney sweep. It clinged to everything. It had a very, very fine and powdery consistency.”

Residents in the neighborhood south of the pier said Tuesday that they felt helpless, almost as much as they did in 1983, when storms flooded many of their oceanfront homes.

“I just don’t know what to do,” said Moore, her eyes reddening as she pointed out black powder on a family heirloom--a needlepoint that covers a piano bench in the living room. “I’m so upset.”

Steve Sweet, who lives about five houses south of Moore, said the shipping company should be fined.

“It’s bad news. I’m wondering about breathing it in,” said Sweet, 34. “I feel pretty much helpless about this. I hope they stick it to ‘em real good. You gotta teach them a lesson.”

Several investigating agencies, including the Coast Guard, were unsure whether charges will be filed against the shipping company, and top city officials gathered Tuesday to try to determine what to do next.

An adjuster for Hapag-Lloyd’s insurers knocked on doors in the neighborhood Tuesday to inform residents that the company would reimburse them. The adjuster will return today, but anyone with damage was urged to call the Crawford Co. at (714) 543-7100.

“This was a completely accidental event, and we’re trying to respond to the people’s concerns and complaints,” said attorney Eric Wise, who represents Hapag-Lloyd’s insurance underwriters. “Some houses are worse than others. Some will need painting while some just need carpet cleaning. We’ve agreed to pay the expenses of indoor cleaning as long as it is documented.”

Wise sent his own investigators to the ship Tuesday to try to find the cause of the discharge.

“We don’t know how it happened. It was not intentional, that’s for sure,” Wise said. “It seems there may have been some problem (with the smokestacks) that they thought they had repaired, but it wasn’t completely repaired.”

The South Coast Air Quality Management District also sent an inspector Tuesday to investigate.

The agency’s regulations allow short venting of ship’s smokestacks but prohibit any discharge into the air that poses a public nuisance, said Mike Czap, the agency’s section chief for enforcement in Long Beach.

Forsythe said she would urge a city investigation, too.

“Accidents that affect the beach need to concern us all. The soot is not as hazardous as an oil spill could be, but we need to be aware of what led to this. I hope we look into it to make sure something like that will never happen again,” she said.

No illnesses or symptoms were reported to county health officials, and there were no reports of injured birds or marine life.