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A major cleanup has been launched to tackle a 126,000-gallon oil slick off the southern California coast, which has forced beach closures and prompted authorities to warn of “substantial ecological impacts “.
The slick is about 13 square miles in area, the U.S. Coast Guard Los Angeles said in a Tweeter Saturday. He added that he was 3 miles off the coast of Newport Beach, a small community 35 miles southeast of Los Angeles.
In a separate statement, he said he was working with a number of agencies, including the California Department of Fisheries and Wildlife’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response, on the clean-up operation. .
Katrina Foley, Orange County Supervisor said in a tweet On Saturday, the oil had already washed up on the Huntington Beach waterfront in Orange County.
“We started to find dead birds and stranded fish on the shore,” she said, adding that the location of the leak was about 5 miles off the coast of Huntington Beach and that the oil continued to spill from a broken pipeline connected to an offshore oil rig.
The USCG said it is working alongside Beta Offshore, which operates three offshore oil platforms in the Beta field off the California coast. Beta Offshore has yet to respond to NBC News inquiries.
The tablecloth had “Significant ecological impactacts “ on Huntington Beach and nearby wetlands, the city of Huntington Beach said in a statement.
Skimming equipment and booms have been deployed to prevent the flow of oil into environmentally sensitive areas, the statement said. He added that he had to cancel the last day of his Pacific Airshow to facilitate clean-up operations.
Describing the situation as a “potential environmental disaster,” Huntington Beach Mayor Kim Carr told NBC Los Angeles about 3,000 barrels of oil or 126,000 gallons were spilled.
The Coast Guard also said it is actively monitoring any wildlife that may have been contaminated with oil, and has asked the public to stay away from the area during the cleanup.
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Although the leak was not completely stopped, the city of Huntington Beach said preliminary repair work had been done to fix the site of the oil spill and that further repair efforts would be attempted on Sunday morning.
He added that the oil plume now extended nearly 6 nautical miles, stretching from the pier at Huntington Beach to Newport Beach, about 5 miles to the south.
The city of Newport Beach said in a statement on Saturday that the slick was expected to dissipate by wind, sun and wave action, but later said it come ashore.
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