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 Up to 2,500 barrels (105,000 gallons) of crude petroleum,
according to latest estimates, gushed onto San Refugio State Beach
and into the Pacific about 20 miles (32 km) west of Santa Barbara on
Tuesday when an underground pipeline that runs along the coastal
highway burst.
As much as a fifth of the amount was believed to have reached the
ocean, leaving oil slicks that stretched for more than 9 miles (15
km) along the coast.
Environmental activists and local officials said it could turn out
to be the largest oil spill in 46 years to hit the ecologically
sensitive but energy-rich Santa Barbara shoreline, about 125 miles
(200 km) northwest of Los Angeles.
The spill zone lies at the edge of a national marine sanctuary and
state-designated underwater preserve teeming with whales, dolphins,
sea lions, some 60 species of sea birds and more than 500 species of
fish. The surrounding waters are shared by nearly two dozen offshore
oil platforms.
 The cleanup has been painstaking and arduous.
Hundreds of contractors garbed head to toe in hazardous-materials
suits worked in shifts around the clock, shoveling blobs of oil from
the sand, raking up tar balls and excavating petroleum-soaked soil
from the heaviest-hit areas.
Meanwhile, cleanup vessels plied the ocean to corral the slicks with
floating booms and skim oil from the surface. "It's a long process," said Coast Guard Captain Jennifer Williams,
federal on-scene coordinator of the spill response. "These types of
things continue on, perhaps for months, to make sure the environment
is restored to its original condition."
Fortunately, the spill was halted relatively soon after it began.
The Texas-based company that owns and operates the pipeline, Plains
All American Pipeline, said it shut the flow about 30 minutes after
pressure irregularities were detected.
TWO BEACHES CLOSED TO PUBLIC
By then, however, a torrent of oil had streamed down a canyon, under
a culvert and out onto the once-pristine Refugio Beach, blackening a
4-mile (6 km) stretch of sand and rocks.
By Thursday, thick globules of tar also littered El Capitan State
Beach a few miles to the east, and the air at both sites was heavy
with fumes that smelled like fresh asphalt.
Park officials said both beaches, popular seaside camping
destinations, would remain closed to the public through the Memorial
Day holiday weekend and into next week.
Kira Redmond, head of conservation organization Santa Barbara
Channelkeeper, said her group found another stretch of shoreline
between Refugio and El Capitan beaches "covered in oil" on
Wednesday.
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She described "massive, thick mats of it, far worse than what I saw
on Refugio or El Capitan."
If the pipeline company's worst-case estimate of its oil release
holds up, it would mark the biggest spill in the region since a 1969
offshore oil well blowout that dumped 80,000 to 100,000 barrels of
crude petroleum into the Santa Barbara Channel.
That disaster, which dwarfs Tuesday's accident, killed thousands of
sea birds and other wildlife and helped spark the modern U.S.
environmental movement.
Wildlife teams were immediately dispatched to rescue any animals
injured by the latest spill and to protect sensitive areas for shore
birds. The toll on wildlife was not yet apparent, but photos showed
oil-covered pelicans and other sea life washed ashore.
State fish and game officials said five oil-covered pelicans and
young sea lion had been rescued.
SAFETY RECORD CHALLENGED
The cause of the rupture remained under investigation, and Plains
said it might be days before the crippled pipe could be examined.
The company said it had inspected the pipeline internally a few
weeks ago, but results were not yet back.
One of the nation's largest pipeline companies, Plains defended its
safety record as it came under fire for what environmental activists
called an excessive number of safety and maintenance infractions
over the past nine years.
Federal records show 20 enforcement actions initiated against the
company by the U.S. Transportation Department since 2006 for such
issues as pipeline corrosion and maintenance problems.
The Los Angeles Times reported Plains has accumulated 175 federal
safety and maintenance infractions since 2006. Plains spokesman
Patrick Hodgins said those figures include many relatively minor
lapses the company reported even when it was not required to do so.
"Safety is not just a priority, but it's a core value at Plains," he
told a news conference.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Santa Barbara; Editing by Curtis
Skinner, Lisa Von Ahn and Ken Wills)
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