North Slope Crude Oil Spill Now Up To 21,000 Gallons, BP Admits

Well, well, well - whaddya know?

At least 21,000 gallons of crude oil spilled from a leaky pipeline in the Prudhoe Bay field, according to an estimate from BP and the state. That's the amount of oil cleanup workers recovered by 5:45 p.m. Friday, 36 hours after discovery of the leak.

The spill ranks as the sixth-largest oil spill ever on the North Slope, and the size is likely to increase once cleanup workers fully assess the extent of the spill. The largest was 38,850 gallons at the Milne Point field in 1989, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

State officials said Monday they were implementing a three-pronged plan to determine the full size of the spill. "We will determine volume estimates in a scientific and systematic fashion," said Leslie Pearson, a DEC on-scene coordinator. Officials said Monday that about 1,260 barrels -- or nearly 53,000 gallons -- of oil and snowmelt had been recovered in cleanup operations.

A BP Exploration (Alaska) Inc. operator found the leaking oil and the line was blocked off and depressurized, but the source of the leak eluded investigative teams for nearly three days. The exact location of the leak was discovered at 1:40 a.m. Sunday inside a low-lying section of the 34-inch transit line, which leads to the trans-Alaska oil pipeline. The section where the leak occurred, about 650 miles north of Anchorage, is covered by gravel to let caribou pass.

EDIT

http://www.adn.com/money/story/7510267p-7421918c.html

Those damned environmentalists, making us cover our pipeline with gravel for the damned caribou.