PLAQUEMINES PARISH, La. — Details surrounding the Main Pass Oil Gathering (MPOG) pipeline leak have been trickling in and Monday, the Coast Guard said 1.1 million gallons of crude oil could have been released before the pipeline was shut off.
By comparison, that's one tenth of the 1989 Exxon Valdez tanker spill.
Senior Policy Director for Healthy Gulf, Matt Rota, said the estimate could continue to increase.
“Especially when estimates come from companies that are, come from the companies, their business interest is to show that the smaller amount is coming out because they are liable for fines," Rota said.
The company that owns MPOG is working with the Coast Guard and other agencies to clean up the spill. As of Monday, 210 gallons of oily-water mixture have been recovered.
NOAA is assisting with overflights and satellite imagery. Doug Helton, NOAA emergency operations coordinator, said the imagery allows them to see where possible oil leaks are, so they can predict where they might go.
“A big spill is really not based on the volume as much as what is the potential impact," Helton said, “There are endangered and threatened species in Louisiana waters. Most of the coastal Louisiana is wetlands and marshes, and that’s typically considered really sensitive to oil.”
So far, the Coast Guard has not reported any onshore impacts.
“Even if this doesn’t make it ashore, it doesn’t mean that this is an incident that we can just ignore. There are a lot of things that live out in the gulf. Probably one of the biggest concerns that we might have is turtles," Rota said.
The location of the leak has not been identified, the Coast Guard said Monday. The Coast Guard is expected to provide an update to the media on Tuesday morning. WWL has reached out to the company that owns the pipeline, but they have not responded.