A massive oil spill that occurred 10 kilometers off shore from Korea’s west coast has recently hit land and devastated the local environment and maritime based economy:

Sea farms and fishing areas on the country’s western coast have been turned into a “sea of oil” following the Friday leakage of oil from a tanker in seas off Taean, South Chungcheong Province, which is believed one of the world’s most devastating sea pollution cases involving oil.

Maritime officials say about 5 percent of the oil has been collected, and about 9,000 soldiers, police, officials and volunteers were struggling to clean up the polluted area, Monday, the fourth day of operations.

The amount of oil spilled _ 10,500 tons _ is more than double the 5,000 tons that leaked from the Sea Prince into seas off Yeosu, South Jeolla Province, Korea’s worst previous oil spill in 1995.

It is also about 28 percent of the 37,000 tons leaked from the Exxon Valdez into Alsaka’s Prince William Sound in 1989, one of the world’s worst sea pollutions by oil. The Alaska cleanup operation cost some $2.5 billion, and the total cost reached $9.5 billion including compensation.

The oil, spilled from the Hong Kong-registered tanker Hebei Spirit after a Samsung-owned barge collided with it, has spread 40 kilometers to the northeast and 50 kilometers to the southeast from the collision spot, 10 kilometers off Taean, which the government has designated as a special disaster area. [Korea Times]

For those that don’t know the Taean area is a maritime national park to the southwest of Seoul:

While looking for the Google Earth image to post I did notice a Hyundai oil refinery complex just to the north of the national park:

I’m assuming this is probably where the Chinese oil tanker was waiting to offload its oil to. The tanker was parked 10 kilometers from the oil refinery waiting for rough seas to subside when apparently the Samsung owned barge was being pulled by a tug boat and the cable pulling the barge broke. I’m not a sailor but it just makes me wonder why a barge was being pulled in rough seas to begin with and if you are going to pull a barge in rough seas why was only one cable being used to pull the barge?Â

In the Army when we pull a trailer with a truck you have the regular trailer hitch to pull it with but also two chains are clipped on between the vehicle and trailer as well just in case the hitch fails. Why didn’t the tug boat operator take any additional safety measures? This seems like common sense to me but what do I know; like I said I’m not a sailor. Â

Nevertheless the environment is devastated. Amazingly the so called environmental group Green Korea United some how found time away from protesting asphalt left on closed down USFK camps to send someone to take pictures of the oil spill:

Volunteers, the Korean Army, and other officials have been busy trying to contain the spill:

The volunteers and authorities are overwhelmed by the spill and the Korean government has requested help from the United States which has agreed to send a response team to help clean up the spill. I have to wonder why the United States is being asked to clean up the spill instead of China who owned the oil tanker and is located right across the Yellow Sea from Korea and could respond sooner. I’m glad though that the US has agreed to help clean the spill. I guess this should make up for creating that monster in the Han River. This does make another thought come to mind, but I won’t say it. (What if the oil tanker was American owned, what would Green Korea’s reaction be then?)

Anyway let’s hope the impact on the environment and the local economy can be minimized by the hard working volunteers and officials working to contain the spill, but right now looking at the pictures it is a tragic situation to have happen on a really scenic area of the country that was totally preventable.

More over at the Marmot & Nomad.

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