Ship concerned in main oil spill leaves San Francisco Bay endlessly – Instances-Herald

The infamous chapter of environmental history in the Bay Area is over because there is no fanfare and most people don’t know it. Or rather, it set sail.

The 873-foot military freighter Cape Mohican, which was involved in the largest oil spill in San Francisco Bay in the last half century, was towed from a long-standing port under the Port of Oakland and the Golden Gate Bridge. on Friday.

It had arrived in Mexico on Wednesday, tied to a tug with a steel rope the thickness of a beer bottle, and on August 1 it was moving at 7 miles an hour on its way to the Panama Canal and then to Beaumont, Texas. Long after that, it was dismantled and recycled at the Brownsville shipyard until the last day.

A huge 50-year-old ship, a gray barge stretching as long as the Trans-American Building was put into service in the Persian Gulf War.

However, his fame (or notoriety) came to fame on October 28, 1996 when a dry dock worker accidentally opened the ship’s valve near Pier 70 in San Francisco, south of what is now Giants Stadium. It occurred. He released water. Instead, 96,000 gallons of heavy black bunker oil were poured out. About 40,000 gallons of oil poured into San Francisco Bay.

Windy weather and early-season storms spread it quickly. The spill blackened for miles along the coasts of Alcatraz and Angel Island, drifted north to the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge and launched onto the beach at Point Reyes National Sea to Half Moon Bay.

“It was horrific to see the pollution,” said Mary Jane Shram, then a volunteer at Farallon Bay National Marine Reserve. “You are entering a beautiful looking beach area and there will be a pool of oil. Your shoes are ruined. There was hardly much under the sand. “

The oil spill was modest but devastating compared to the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989, which dumped 11 million gallons of oil into the pristine Prince William Sound of Alaska. was.

Nearly 600 birds, including the little grebes, gulls, red-throated grebes and pelicans, were found dead and covered in oil. Thousands of coatings were applied but could not be captured or recovered.

A seagrass bed spilled in the bay, in which herring spawns annually. At least 12 seals were oiled. The oil has spread to marinas, piers and sea walls along the San Francisco waterfront. Overall, investigators reported that the 120-mile coastline was contaminated with oil spills and tar balls.

In October 1996, oil leaked from Cape Mohawk at Pier 70 in San Francisco. (California Department of Fish and Wildlife)

The spill was the largest in San Francisco Bay since 1988. At that time, 432,000 gallons of crude oil spilled from a broken storage tank at Shell’s Martinez Refinery into streams and swamps and into the bay. When the cargo ship Cosco Busan hit the Bay Bridge in the fog in 2007 and dumped 53,569 gallons of bunker fuel into its waters, it was eleven years before another major oil spill hit the bay.

“I rarely find anything so big and fast,” said Michael Roseau, an Auckland attorney who was general secretary of the San Francisco Baykeeper environmental group during the 1996 disaster.

The ship is now nearing the end of its lifespan.

Tech-wise, the US Maritime Bureau, a branch of the Department of Transportation that owns the ship, says its status has been downgraded. The Cape Mohawk was part of the National Defense Reserve Fleet for many years. This is a group of cargo ships that can be put into service during war. It is currently “owned”, a sort of waste from an old ship, sealed and repaired without a crew, often waiting to be recycled.

“It’s basically being scrapped. It’s too expensive to run, ”said Sal Mercogliano, marine historian and history professor at Campbell University in North Carolina.

Steam ships like Cape Mohawk have been replaced by diesel ships, he said. The ship was designed to carry barges that could carry ammunition and grenades. But the technology has been replaced by container ships, he said.

Some parliamentary leaders, including Congressman John Garamendi and D-Davis, are pushing the Pentagon to replace old cargo ships faster.

“There are concerns about how military equipment and supplies (beans, bullets, gasoline) can be delivered to the military in the event of a conflict,” said Mercogliano.

Marine Administration and San Francisco Dry Dock Inc after oil spill damage aggregated. The case was settled in 1998 for $ 8 million. Approximately $ 4.3 million was repaid to state and federal agencies for oil purification.

An additional $ 3.6 million was invested in an environmental remediation fund overseen by the National Park Service and other agencies.

Coast Guard members experienced an oil-absorbing boom in San Francisco Bay during the 1996 Cape Mohawk oil spill. (US Coast Guard)

Over the next decade, the money will be used from clearing debris and invading plants in San Francisco’s Crissy Field to restoring the Farallon Islands’ wolf, lizard and other bird nests, and building new stairs in the Bay Area. Paid for 12 major projects. A hiking trail for hikers on Angel Island.

The number of oil spills from California ships has declined in recent decades due to the double hull structure of oil tankers and the stringent legislation that requires crew training. But according to experts, there are always risks.

“People forget how awful it’s going to be,” said Ed Uber, a former director of Farallon Bay National Marine Reserve. “These big ships are controlled by humans. I was an officer on a merchant ship. I know that people make mistakes. “

OAKLAND, CA – JULY 9: Cape Mohican, which caused a major oil spill in San Francisco Bay in 1996, crossed the Bay Bridge as seen from the Port of Oakland in Oakland, California on Friday, July 9, 2021. She was towed away. (Reichves / Bay Area Newsgroup)

Ship involved in major oil spill leaves San Francisco Bay forever – Times-Herald source link