Cleanup of Oil Spill at Beach Progresses : Oxnard: Death toll among birds and wildlife rises. Company officials are still unable to say what caused the leak.

As the death toll among birds and other wildlife inhabiting McGrath State Beach rose by the hour, crews made some progress Tuesday in cleaning up 84,000 gallons of runaway crude oil.

Although a Bush Oil Co. spokesman said that more than 36,000 gallons of the thick black toxic substance had been recovered so far, park officials moved to close four miles of Oxnard beaches as the cleanup continued there.

Executives at Bush Oil, which owns the pipeline that ruptured sometime before Christmas morning and sent crude oozing into McGrath Lake, were still unable to say Tuesday what caused the leak or how old the line is.

But state experts have said the pipeline probably ruptured due to corrosion and old age.

A U.S. Coast Guard inspector said the company was granted permission to excavate the section of pipeline that ruptured, but Bush executives said they were not prepared Tuesday to begin digging.

More workers and heavy equipment helped busy crews gain a handle on much of the oil that discharged into a canal leading to the ocean, but the lake remains badly marred, with tar and oil clumped along its shores.

Federal officials on Monday concluded the offshore-cleanup effort, saying they had skimmed as much oil from the ocean surface as possible.

Thousands of gallons of heavy crude were pushed into the ocean after the underground pipe near Gonzales Road and Harbor Boulevard ruptured, filling McGrath Lake with oil. The rising lake level triggered an automated pump, which moved the oil into a drainage canal and then to the ocean.

By late Tuesday, five dozen workers from the California Conservation Corps had joined the cleanup fight at McGrath Lake, where volunteers were pulling oil-covered shore birds and water fowl from the wetlands.

Meanwhile, state officials on Tuesday confirmed that a park ranger ignored a report by campers at McGrath State Beach that oil was spewing into the lake a full day before other government workers discovered the spill Christmas morning.

Ranger Gerald Weil was told early last Friday--nearly 24 hours before the spill was spotted by others--that crude oil might be leaking from somewhere near the campground, Chief Ranger Richard Rojas said Tuesday.

“If you’re given information, you’re supposed to take action,” said Rojas, who said the incident is under investigation and that Weil may be disciplined.

Tuesday afternoon, state Fish and Game veterinarian Dave Jessup said 62 oil-coated birds were found dead and another 32 had been found near death. Jessup said he expected the number of dead birds to double or triple before initial cleanup at McGrath Lake is finished.

“With the limited access to the entire area so far, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a lot more (dead water fowl),” Jessup said.

One heavy equipment operator Tuesday found a German shepherd covered with thick black oil wandering Harbor Boulevard.

The dog, which had no identification tags, was taken to the makeshift care center erected in the Ventura County Animal Control parking lot in Camarillo. It was expected to survive.

State Fish and Game biologist Heidi Togstad also said Tuesday that 1,000 to 2,000 pismo clams are the latest apparent victims of the spill.

“They are freshly dead,” Togstad said. “They washed up with the incoming tide.”

Togstad said the clams are a major food source to many of the shore birds that inhabit the Ventura coast, but that it is too soon to determine what effect the loss would have on birds.

At a press conference Tuesday, state and federal officials said they were standing by their Monday estimate that the spill involved up to 2,000 barrels of crude oil. There are 42 gallons of oil per barrel, meaning that up to 84,000 gallons were discharged.

A Bush Oil spokesman had insisted Sunday that the spill was no greater than 250 barrels.

The cleanup effort was speeded up Tuesday with the help of additional people and new equipment brought in by numerous government agencies and private firms. By 6 a.m. Tuesday, hundreds of workers had reclaimed a total of 874 barrels of heavy crude.

“We essentially doubled the production rate over the last few days,” said U.S. Coast Guard Cmdr. James Rutkovsky.

State park officials have closed the beaches between Channel Islands Harbor and the Santa Clara River for the length of the cleanup because thousands of tar balls have washed ashore. State workers would not speculate on how long the beach cleanup would take, but one worker said he expected the effort to take at least a week.

On Tuesday, seven crews of up to 20 members each were walking one-mile sections of the coastline between the Pierpont area of Ventura and Channel Islands Harbor. Armed with rakes and shovels, cleanup crews filled clear plastic bags with thousands of pounds of tainted sand.

Bush Oil officials said they expected mechanical beach sweepers to be deployed by today.

But the spill was not the only area of concern Tuesday.

An Oxnard inspector was on the Bush site to verify that the company was not discharging its waste water into the city sewer. Bush’s permit to discharge water into the municipal system was revoked in September, 1992, because the company had dumped ground water with higher amounts of oil, grease and other toxins than allowed.

“They were discharging waste water that wasn’t within our standards,” said Robert Montgomery, the Oxnard environmental control manager.

Despite the spill, Bush Oil derricks on the site just south of Gonzales Road are still pumping oil.

But company executives would not say how much the Montalvo Lease is producing, how many other pipes are on the land or what precautions they are taking to ensure that other aging lines do not collapse.

“Right now we’re only concerned with cleaning this thing up,” said spokesman Raymond Hatch.

Bush Oil Co., a division of Taft-based Berry Petroleum, could face substantial penalties when investigations into the oil leak are completed.

Stephen L. Sawyer, a staff attorney with state Fish and Game’s Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response, said the company could be fined $10 for each gallon that workers are unable to reclaim.

Fish and Game is the lead investigator of the accident and will sign off on cleanup efforts.

That administrative penalty would be separate from a civil offense, which could mean penalties of up to $250,000, Sawyer said.

Additionally, the Ventura County district attorney’s office could prosecute company executives criminally if negligence is found, and the state Water Quality Control Board could levy its own fines or penalties, Sawyer said.