Crews Work to Contain Oil Spill, Save Birds

A team of veterinarians and wildlife experts worked Tuesday to treat at least 24 oil-soaked seabirds while, offshore, hundreds of Coast Guard and oil industry personnel sought to contain the spread of the 2-day-old spill from a pipeline in the Santa Barbara Channel.

Estimated at 200 to 500 barrels, the spilled oil has been washing ashore along a five-mile stretch of beach near the mouth of the Santa Ynez River on the Air Force base.

By late Tuesday, the 24 contaminated birds--including gulls, cormorants, a grebe, a snowy plover, a least tern and a brown pelican--had been rescued and turned over to veterinarians working out of an abandoned fire station on the base. Twelve dead birds, including gulls, a murre and a least tern, were also retrieved. About 50 others were seen on the oil slick but had not yet been captured.

“It’s a tragedy. It was an accident that happened. It’s something you don’t plan to happen,” said Art Boehm, a spokesman for Torch Operating Co., the Houston-based firm that owns the pipeline.

According to the company, the spill occurred when an undersea pipeline separated from a flange Sunday. The 10-mile pipeline carries oil from an offshore drilling platform to a storage facility on Nipomo Mesa in San Luis Obispo County, just north of Santa Barbara County.

Company spokesmen said oil had stopped leaking from the pipe, which would be temporarily repaired with waterproof tape flown in Tuesday from Texas. A permanent method of fixing the pipe will have to be approved by the Coast Guard and the U.S. Minerals Management Service, Boehm said.

Most of the oil flowing from the break floated in long patches and strips across a four- to five-square-mile swath of ocean.

Although control of the slick was hampered early Tuesday by fog, a flotilla of vessels had skimmed off or contained about 150 barrels by midday, company officials said.

On the beach, cleanup crews used rakes, bulldozers and sod rollers draped with absorbent material to remove the oil. It was coming ashore in drops and globs, some the size of marbles, others as large as dinner plates.

A natural sand barrier across the mouth of the Santa Ynez River may be providing the best protection, wildlife experts said, preventing oil-laden tidal flows from entering an estuary where birds feed and nest.

Company officials, who estimated the cleanup cost at $1 million, were hopeful of completing the beach cleanup within 72 hours.

But it will be 10 days to two weeks before any of the rescued birds are released back into the wild, said Jonna Mazet, the California Department of Fish and Game veterinarian who is directing the rehabilitation effort.