S.F. Bay oil spill illuminates flaws in response plans

Matt Weiser and Carrie Peyton Dahlberg
Sacramento Bee
11/16/2007

California has long been recognized for maintaining one of the world's toughest oil spill prevention and response systems. But last week's spill into San Francisco Bay revealed a number of flaws that may have turned a modest incident into a disaster.

The 910-foot container ship Cosco Busan struck a Bay Bridge tower at about 8:27 a.m. on Nov. 7. The impact tore open the ship's hull and two fuel tanks, spilling an estimated 58,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil into the bay.

A week later the true consequences of that moderate spill are still emerging.

As of Thursday, more than 20 Bay Area beaches remained closed, more than 830 birds had died, and crab fishing was halted between San Mateo and Point Reyes. On Thursday, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered a full state investigation.

Experts say the 120 minutes after any oil spill are the most critical. A week later, many involved agreed the first two hours after this incident were misspent.

"It's really clear there was just a fundamental failure of what was supposed to be a world-reknowned response system," said Linda Sheehan, executive director of the California Coastkeeper Alliance, who also sits on a committee that advises the state Office of Spill Prevention and Response.

A key rupture in the response was that local cleanup crews under contract to the Cosco Busan were not notified about the incident until 50 minutes after the impact, at about 9:17 a.m., according to various accounts.

It took another 33 minutes for the first cleanup boat to reach the scene, said Peter Benz, president of the primary cleanup contractor, Marine Spill Response Corp. That boat carried only two people and no cleanup boom to corral oil, Benz said.

Within two hours of the first alarm, four more MSRC vessels arrived with 3,700 feet of boom. But that was insufficient; the spill was bigger than first reported.

The initial report to MSRC put the spill at 420 gallons. It wasn't until 1 p.m. that MSRC learned that the spill was much bigger.

By then there were eight vessels on the water and about a mile-and-a-half of boom. But they were trying to corral a moving target: The Cosco Busan moved twice, trailing oil with it. The tide had turned, ebbing out of the bay at more than 2 knots, spreading oil far and wide.

California's oil-spill response system, like its federal counterpart, was adopted in 1990 in the wake of the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska, which was 200 times bigger than last week's incident.

The state requires shipping companies and cleanup contractors to submit to unannounced drills and inspections to prove their response capabilities. The state Office of Spill Prevention and Response (OSPR) was created to conduct these inspections and police the industry, using a fee charged on each barrel of oil sold in the state.

The federal system relies on the honor system, allowing the industry to prove readiness by submitting its own drill records to the Coast Guard, which doesn't conduct surprise drills.

But both systems give industry a major hand in their own regulation, an approach now being questioned.

The Marine Spill Response Corp. is beholden to a nonprofit operated by the oil industry. Its regional vice president also chairs the technical committee that advises the state OSPR, where the oil industry has another seat, now held by a representative of British Petroleum.

Oil industry representatives and the owners of the ship did not respond to calls from The Bee for comment.

But MSRC's Benz said the response system is adequate and that the industry must have a role in its operation.

At the federal level, when Congress passed the Oil Pollution Act in 1990, it also gave the oil industry a strong role in cleanup and remediation planning.

That may mean that the same company involved in a spill helps determine how much oil leaked, how much damage was done and how to restore the environment.

"The Coast Guard really has had this culture of saying, 'Well, how can we make your life easier as a ship owner?' said Rick Steiner, a professor at the University of Alaska's marine advisory program.

A 2003 spill in Buzzards Bay off Massachusetts came in for criticism similar to what's heard now around San Francisco.

The size of the spill was underestimated and alcohol tests for a tugboat crew were delayed so long that their validity was compromised. Similar tests of the Cosco Busan crew have been questioned.

State law requires the ship's own crew to report spills "immediately" to cleanup contractors designated as first responders.

Benz said the MSRC was notified not by the ship's crew, but by the local pilot who boarded to guide the Cosco Busan through the bay.

Reports suggest the ship's crew may not have been familiar with these procedures. The ship was said to be sailing with a new Chinese crew.

The case also highlights another flaw in the state's system of regulations: The Office of Spill Prevention and Response, according to a wide variety of observers, does not have the manpower to police the industry.

The department is allowed to order unannounced spill-response drills, which would reveal whether the crew knows whom to call and when.

More than 7,400 ships visit the state, and all are required to have a spill-response plan approved by the state. There are more than 2,200 of these plans, because some plans cover more than one ship.

OSPR has only nine inspectors to oversee all this ship traffic, said Bud Leland, the department's deputy administrator. Less than 1 percent of those ships are subjected to unannounced drills.

In 2005, a Department of Finance audit found the department was sitting on $18 million in unspent money collected from oil taxes, funds meant to hire more inspectors.

In the latest state budget, the Schwarzenegger administration agreed to add $7.3 million and 9.2 positions to the department.

But Sheehan said more personnel are needed. During the budget process, she said, the department said it needed 34 people for an "adequate" program.

Leland said more inspectors are needed to conduct unannounced drills.

"Given the volume of vessel traffic in California, it would be good to do more of those," Leland said. "Those are not expensive in general because they test the notification ability of the ships to call out their spill response resources."

Schwarzenegger wants investigators to recommend changes. He's likely to get many suggestions.

Ted Lempert, the former Democratic state assemblyman who co-wrote the legislation that created OSPR, said he was "horrified" as the spill unfolded.

"We felt the prevention and cleanup measures were really strong and that's why this is so frustrating," he said. "The government should have done what it was supposed to have done, and that is to really oversee and monitor and make sure these crews were ready."