Press-Register
Oil washes up on Baldwin County beaches
Published: Thursday, August 12, 2010
http://blog.al.com/live/2010/08/oil_washes_up_on_baldwin_count.html
ORANGE BEACH, Ala. -- Though the tropical depression in the Gulf fizzled, what was left of the storm on Thursday morning was enough to churn up submerged oil and carry it ashore, staining tide lines into Baldwin County's beaches and depositing sporadic clumps of soiled sargassum and tarballs.
In a Thursday morning e-mail to local government leaders, a U.S. Coast Guard official acknowledged that what had washed up was being classified as subsurface oil -- something that cleanup officials have been slow to acknowledge.
"We've been saying there's submerged oil coming into (Perdido Pass) for some time and (BP PLC) completely dismissed our concerns and our accounts," said Orange Beach Mayor Kennon. "Hopefully this proves we're not a bunch of dummies."
Since early last week BP has rejected claims from Orange Beach that city contractors are regularly encountering and collecting oil from inshore waters, including Cotton Bayou, Terry Cove and Bayou St. John, city officials said.
"BP keeps telling us there is no oil, to skim or otherwise, and we keep telling them there is," said Orange Beach Coastal Resource Manager Phillip West. "We're skimming it."
BP spokesman Ray Melick said that company officials "don't believe what the mayor's crew is finding is oil."
To resolve the dispute, Orange Beach, which is doing its own water quality testing independent of the BP-funded cleanup effort, has agreed, at the oil company's request, to call Alabama Department of Environmental Management scientists to skimming sites to collect samples for third-party analysis.
Read more : http://blog.al.com/live/2010/08/oil_washes_up_on_baldwin_count.html
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