Ventura County oil spill misses beach, but damage on land is unclear
Sean Anderson, a professor at Cal State Channel Islands, collects samples to test for toxicity from a creek in Prince Barranca after an oil spill in Ventura County. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)
Joseph Serna and Veronica Rocha and Matt Hamilton
An oil spill that may have released more than 29,000 gallons of crude into a grassy canyon in Ventura County did not reach the beach or trigger evacuations, Ventura County fire officials said Thursday.
The pipeline leak was spotted about 5:30 a.m. in a gorge called Prince Barranca and originally was estimated to involve up to 5,000 barrels of crude, Ventura County Fire Department spokesman Mike Lindbery said. That estimate later was reduced to 700 barrels at most.
There are 42 gallons per barrel, meaning up to 29,400 gallons of crude may have been released.
The pump that was allowing the oil to flow was shut down quickly, and the leakage formed a small lake across the street from homes on Hall Canyon Road. About 15 city and county workers in white hazmat suits were using hoses to suck the gooey mess into trucks that carry about 4,000 gallons each, officials said.
Crude oil has coated rocks and creek beds, but details on the environmental impact were not immediately available.
Lindbery said it also was fortunate that the oil did not get into the storm drain system, which could spread the vapors from the crude more widely, especially if temperatures rose.
Still, there is some concern about vapors, authorities said. Residents have been alerted that if they are sensitive to odors, they should get out of the area. No mandatory evacuations have been ordered.
The oil spill occurred on a cool, overcast morning, but Tom Kruschke, spokesman for Ventura County Fire, said there are concerns that if the marine layer lifts, warmer temperatures could send more crude oil vapors into the air.
Initial monitoring showed hydrogen sulfide in the air, but more recent air tests did not, Kruschke said. The hazardous materials team is continuing to monitor air quality.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ventura County Fire and Ventura City Fire, among other agencies, have responded to the incident and are coordinating their response from San Buenaventura State Beach, about 1.5 miles from Hall Canyon.
The leak was not an “environmental threat” to the beach, Lindbery said.
Amy Norris, a spokeswoman with the state Office of Spill Prevention and Response, said investigators were at the site to assess the spill.
Live updates: Oil spill in Ventura County
The oil is from Ventura County and the 10-inch pipeline delivers crude to the Los Angeles Basin, including Exxon Mobil’s Torrance refinery.
The oil spilled from a valve that last underwent maintenance on Wednesday and since has been closed.
The underground pipeline was not “at full flow, full pressure,” said Crimson spokeswoman Kendall Klingler.
On Thursday, authorities feared the oil could flow out near the beach at Sanjon Road and the 101 Freeway, Lindbery said. But the leak was farther inland and never reached a second pipeline that would have pumped it out toward the ocean, Ventura County firefighter Marisol Rodriguez said.
The spill went about a half-mile down Hall Canyon Road in the barranca, she said.
“The pump has been shut down. There’s no way it can get to the ocean,” Rodriguez said. “They’re in cleanup mode.”
Unlike most barrancas, which flow directly to the sea, Prince Barranca is equipped with a debris catch basin that typically pools storm water and filters out debris. In Thursday’s pipeline leak, the oil pooled in this basin, officials said.
The U.S. Coast Guard dispatched a crew off the coast with booms in case the oil reached the water, officials said.
County officials said the leaked oil belonged to Aera Energy. The company denied it was theirs.
Aera spokeswoman Cindy Pollard said the pipeline and oil is owned by Crimson, not her company. The pipeline contained product from Aera and possibly other operators. Aera, she said, has offered to assist Crimson with the spill.
Klingler said the spill involved at most 600 barrels of oil. The company is investigating the leak, which happened on the V-10 line.
“Right now, our first priority is getting it cleaned up and making sure everyone is safe,” she said.
Crimson has had 10 spills involving corrosion, equipment failure and excavation damage since 2006, resulting in more than $5.8 million in property damage, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline & Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
In total, approximately 7,453 barrels of hazardous liquid has been spilled since 2006, records show.
The Colorado-based company has 661 miles of pipeline running through California. There have been no federal inspections of Crimson pipelines since at least 2006, federal records show.
The largest leak in Ventura was in 2008, according to federal records. In that spill, the company cited material, welding and equipment failure as a cause for the leak.
A ruptured or leaking seal/pump packing spilled 6,679 barrels, resulting in a loss of $654,300.
The costliest incident in the past 10 years for the company was in Los Angeles in September 2013, when electrical arcing from equipment caused more than $3.1 million in property damage, federal records indicate.
On Dec. 8, a leak released 211 barrels in Somis after an error during an excavation operation. The incident caused $525,700 in property damage.
The damage from Thursday’s spill has yet to be determined.
On Sept. 21, corrosion on a pipeline in Camarillo leaked 24 barrels, causing more than $41,000 in property damage.
Thursday’s oil spill comes more than a year after 143,000 gallons of crude oil spilled onto Refugio State Beach in Santa Barbara. Some of the oil got into the Pacific Ocean, creating tar balls that were found as far away as Manhattan Beach.
In that spill, the oil company, Plains All American Pipeline, was indicted in May on 46 criminal counts, including four felony charges of knowingly discharging a pollutant into state waters.
The Houston-based company faces fines of nearly $3 million. A 41-year-old employee who worked as an environmental and regulatory compliance specialist also faces three charges.
Operators had shut down Line 901 at 11:30 a.m. on May 19 after seeing “abnormalities.”
Workers near Refugio State Beach didn’t know about the leak until they received reports of oil in the water from state parks staff about noon that day.
By 1:30 p.m., they had realized oil was reaching the ocean via a storm culvert near where the corroded pipe had broken. Federal regulators were not alerted until nearly 3 p.m.
The rupture had devastating effects on wildlife in the area: 204 birds and 106 marine mammals died as a result of the spill, according to UC Davis’ Oiled Wildlife Care Network, which was involved in recovery efforts.
“We will never forget what we experienced in the days following that spill: a half-mile slick of crude oil along our coast, the stench of petroleum, oil-drenched birds, holiday visitors sent home and a beach transformed into a toxic cleanup site,” said state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara).
Though Thursday’s spill did not reach the beach, the incident serves as a reminder of the risks of coastal oil operations, an attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity said in a statement.
“This major spill is another grim example of why we must get pipelines and oil drilling out of California’s vulnerable coastal environment. The spill’s already causing environmental damage,” attorney Kristen Monsell said. “We’ve got to stop thinking about these oil spills as accidents and start regarding them as completely predictable ecological tragedies that we can prevent with strong action.”