South Korea says oil slick breaking up as foreign help arrives

Yahoo News 14 Dec 07;

Workers battling South Korea's worst oil spill have broken up a big seaborne oil slick, the Coast Guard said Friday, but environmentalists warned it still poses a pollution danger.

Foreign aid began arriving to help disperse the remnants of the slick and to clean up tourist beaches and scores of marine farms already fouled by the crude oil.

A week after a holed supertanker spilt some 10,500 tons into the Yellow Sea, the Coast Guard said the oil had been broken into smaller slicks containing tar-like clumps. Some had washed ashore, partly coating the beach of scenic Anmyeon Island.

"Most of the (major) oil slicks on the sea have either been broken up or removed," a national spokesman for the Coast Guard told AFP.

A Coast Guard spokesman in hard-hit Taean county, 110 kilometres (69 miles) southwest of Seoul, said efforts to disperse the main slick are starting to pay off and the clean-up is making progress.

"Beaches here are being cleaned up fast," he said.

Some 16 aircraft and 254 vessels were combating the spillage Friday along with some 25,000 people, including 10,100 volunteers.

Four decontamination experts from the US Coast Guard have arrived to help.

Singapore's decontamination agency pledged one airplane and other equipment, while China and Japan promised to send 65 tons and 10 tons of oil absorbents respectively.

China said two ships carrying the material left Qingdao port Thursday night.

Earlier, the Northwest Pacific Action Plan, part of a United Nations programme, said it would provide 100 tons of absorbents.

The accident happened when a drifting barge carrying a construction crane smashed into the anchored 147,000-ton Hong Kong-registered supertanker Hebei Spirit and holed it in three places on December 7.

The government, accused of a slow response to the spill, has offered up to 300 billion won (325 million dollars) in emergency funds to support small businesses and marine farmers.

But environmentalists say the oil clumps pose a long-term threat.

Activist Lee Pyeong-Ju said oil balls an inch wide (2.5 centimeters) were seen off some beaches.

"The heavy oil balls below the water surface are hard to clean up as they float up and down in accordance with changes in temperature. They may sink to the seabed, or wash onto shores and coat beaches," he told AFP.

"In this case, the fallout from the oil spill will last pretty long."