Incident Name: Scarborough Marsh
Subject: Report - Final
Incident Date: 11/15/1994
Incident Location: Scarborough, Maine
Author: Stephen Lehmann
Latitude: 43° 38"
Longitude: 070° 30"
USCG District: 1
Product: #2 heating fuel
Type: 2
Volume: less than 57 barrels (2,400 gallons)
Source:tanker truck
RAR: periodically submerged salt/fresh water marsh
Dispersants: N
Bioremediation: N
In-Situ Burning: No, but suggested
Special Interest Topic(s): none
Shoreline Type(s) Impacted: inland marsh
Summary: On November 15, 1994, a Dead River Fuel Company delivery truck loaded with approximately 2,400 gallons of #2 heating fuel overturned into a marsh. Dead River Fuel Co. took responsibility and hired a local cleanup contractor. The contractor deployed protection and containment boom and began skimming product. A technique of digging small holes in the peat was used to collect sufficient quantities of oil to remove. In-situ burning was suggested and denied by the FOSC.
Behavior: The oil saturated the upper layer of peat in the marsh.
Countermeasures/Mitigation: A controlled burn of the marsh was suggested by the spiller and agreed to by the State of Maine responders on-site. The FOSC from Marine Safety Office (MSO) Portland requested input from the NOAA SSC prior to approving the burn. After discussing the request with a NOAA contractor, the SSC sent a memorandum to the OSC on November 16, 1994, discouraging the use of in-situ burning in this case for the following reasons:
The level of water covering vegetation was too low to protect the root systems from injury.
There was relatively little remaining fuel, natural, less intrusive options were preferred.
This spill was in a peat bog and peat marshes do not allow free-and- easy liquid flow. The peat would act as a combustion source and maintaining a burn as pockets of fuel remain isolated and frequent re-ignition would be required. Control, particularly with the proximity of homes, was a concern.
The request for in-situ burning was denied.
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