(Moscow) An oil spill, caused by the sinking of two oil tankers in the Kerch Strait between annexed Crimea and Russia, could pollute up to 200,000 tonnes of soil, the Russian Minister of Natural Resources said on Monday.
Posted at 1:36 p.m.
According to forecasts, “the volume of polluted soil could reach 200,000 tonnes,” declared this minister, Alexander Kozlov, during a meeting, a video extract of which was broadcast by the Zvezda channel on Telegram.
On December 15, two Russian tankers, the Volgoneft-212 and the Volgoneft-239ran aground during a storm in the Kerch Strait. It separates Russia from Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, which it annexed in 2014.
The ships were carrying 9,200 tonnes of fuel oil, around 40% of which may have spilled into the sea, according to Russian authorities.
Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized Thursday that it was an “ecological catastrophe”.
Black fuel oil was deposited on dozens of kilometers of beaches in the Krasnodar region, in southwest Russia. The seaside resort of Anapa, popular with tourists, was particularly affected.
The port city of Kerch, in annexed Crimea, also saw blocks of fuel oil arriving on its shores, according to images released by the authorities.
Volunteers, in white protective gear, were working to rid the beaches of the Krasnodar region of viscous clumps of fuel oil carried by the current, according to images published Monday by the governor.
But so that their work is not “in vain”, it will be necessary to work as quickly as possible at sea, “where the source of the pollution is”, indicated Governor Veniamine Kondratiev on Telegram.
“The volunteers said that last night almost everything was cleaned up, but overnight the waves deposited oil again,” he said.
The authorities also released images of birds stained with fuel oil, being treated by volunteers.
Ten dolphins could also have been killed by the oil spill, the specialized Delpha center estimated on Sunday, specifying that analyzes were necessary to confirm the cause of their death.
“This is an extremely alarming situation,” this scientific institution which protects dolphins in the Black Sea warned on Telegram.
