Aggiornamenti dalle Galapagos

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Oil Spill Spreads in Ecuador's Galapagos Islands

Last updated: 23 Jan 2001 09:30 GMT (Reuters)

Reuters Photo
By Amy Taxin

QUIT0 (Reuters) - Ecuador declared a national emergency in the Galapagos
Islands after an oil spill just a half-mile from the shore floated toward
the westernmost islands, threatening some of the world's rarest sea animals
and birds, officials said.

"For us, this is the equivalent of an earthquake," said presidential
spokesman Alfredo Negrete, explaining that the state of emergency would let
the government immediately channel the funds needed for cleanup.

The Galapagos Islands, 600 miles west of Ecuador's coast in the Pacific
Ocean, are home to hundreds of native species -- including giant tortoises
and iguanas -- that evolved over thousands of years.

The spill started on Friday, when a pipe burst in the machine room of the
Ecuadorean-registered boat Jessica, which had ran aground three days before
on an embankment near Galapagos' capital and principal port, Puerto
Baquerizo Moreno on San Cristobal Island.

It grew worse over the weekend, when tanks carrying 240,000 gallons of
diesel and bunker fuel -- a heavy fuel used to power some tour boats
operating in the islands -- leaked 144,000 gallons of oil into ocean waters
shared by tropical fish, pelicans and sea lions.

"It's a superficial film. We're not talking about something very thick,"
Adm. Gonzalo Vega, director of Ecuador's Merchant Marine, told Reuters,
adding that "it's moving toward the west, toward the other islands," about
30 and 40 miles away.

The Jessica, 211 feet long and weighing 835 tons, was on its way to service
a private tour boat operator and Petrocomercial, an arm of the state oil
company that provides the islands with fuel.

While the accident is far smaller than the Exxon Valdez supertanker's 1989
spill of 11 million gallons of oil in Alaskan seas, the unique ecological
makeup of the Galapagos and the spill's closeness to its shores have sparked
outcries from environmental organizations worldwide.

The stain over the clear blue Pacific waters had an overall area of 390
square miles late on Sunday. It is now moving westward toward Santa Cruz
Island but growing thinner as it travels, posing less of a threat, Vega
said. He added that he hoped the oil would be dispersed in 48 to 72 hours.

ANIMALS IN DANGER

According to the Galapagos National Park, 30 pelicans, four sea lions and
seven boobies have been affected by the spill. One Franklin sea gull died.

The Charles Darwin Research Station on San Cristobal Island and the
Galapagos National Park have set up rescue sites to help clean feathers and
fur and have placed barriers to stop sea creatures from coming into contact
with the oil.

The long-lasting impact of the spill remained unclear, though local
environmental watchdog the Nature Foundation said it would have
"irreparable" consequences.

"Obviously, the longer they wait to remove this layer (of oil), the plants
beneath the ocean's surface will weaken or die, and the entire food chain
will be altered," Ricardo Moreno, director of foundation, told Reuters.

As the oily film spreads, it blocks sunlight from the plant life on the
ocean floor, Moreno said, altering the relationship among the species
developed over centuries.

The World Wide Fund for Nature, a global conservation body, called for
limits to shipping off the Galapagos, which British naturalist Charles
Darwin visited in 1835 while developing his theories of national selection.

In 1999, about 66,000 tourists visited the islands, about 81 percent of them
foreign.

CLEANUP UNDER WAY A 10-member U.S. Coast Guard mission arrived late on
Sunday to work with Ecuadorean authorities to drain the remaining 30,000
gallons of fuel from the boat, which is tipping into the water. Once the
fuel is removed and the threat of more spillage averted, the team will work
to contain the oil already in the waters and then to rescue the Jessica,
Vega said.

Ecuadorean authorities have applied 3,000 gallons of chemical dispersants
and 1,000 gallons of absorbents and put up a fence to try to keep the toxic
substances from reaching nearby Santa Fe Island.

The mission will cost the economically battered Ecuadorean government about
$500,000. Guayaquil-based shipping company Acotramar, which owns the
Jessica, will be held responsible for the costs, Cerbino said, though the
boat lacks spill insurance.

According to Ecuador's Merchant Marine, boats carrying less than 2,000 tons
of hydrocarbons are not required by law to have an insurance policy to cover
spills.

Several environmental leaders have said that the vessel became stuck because
its captain erred when entering the bay. Fernando Espinoza,
secretary-general of the Darwin Station, told TC television he thought
Ecuador's government had acted promptly but bureaucracy had delayed the aid
the islands desperately needed.

"In order to comply with all the requirements of the U.S. Embassy, a letter
signed by one minister, then another minister, everything got delayed," he
said.

But Hernan Vilema, San Cristobal's mayor, was more critical, accusing
Ecuador's Environment Ministry of acting too slowly and the state oil
company of caring more about its losses than the contamination.

"For me, they're the guilty ones, the government, the Environment Ministry
and Petrocomercial," he told reporters.
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