(Moscow) Russian authorities announced on Friday that they had detected a new fuel oil leak in one of the two tankers that sank in mid-December between Russia and Crimea, causing an oil spill with serious consequences. environmental.
Posted at 9:16 a.m.
“A leak of petroleum products was detected at the rear of the tanker Volganeft-239 », announced the service which manages the crisis in the Krasnodar region, in south-west Russia.
On December 15, two tankers, including the Volganeft-239ran aground during a storm in the Kerch Strait, between Russia and annexed Crimea, causing massive pollution in the Black Sea.
In a video accompanying the press release from the crisis management service of the Krasnodar region, we can see the Volganeft-239 embedded along the shore on the Russian coast, half leaning. Fuel oil is visible in the water.
According to the Russian Ministry of Transport, the exposed slick is approximately 2800 m2 and five ships were dispatched to eliminate it.
Russian authorities and volunteers have been carrying out a vast clean-up operation since mid-December, involving thousands of people, but the situation continues to cause concern.
PHOTO BY RUSSIAN MINISTRY OF EMERGENCY SITUATIONS, PROVIDED BY ASSOCIATED PRESS
-Several cetaceans, including porpoises, have been found dead in recent weeks, deplored a specialized Russian NGO and the head of a group of volunteers cleaning contaminated areas. And many birds covered in fuel oil have been seen.
In total, more than 147,000 tons of contaminated sand and soil were removed from dozens of kilometers of coastline in Russia, according to this source.
15 kilometers from Anapa, a seaside town affected by pollution, “we smell the smell of fuel oil,” Maïa Mechkaroudnik, a resident of the region who also helps save sick birds, told AFP.
The pollution also reached the Ukrainian Crimean peninsula, annexed by Moscow in 2014, in particular the port of Sevastopol, located approximately 250 km from the disaster. On Wednesday, local authorities said they feared “a worsening” of the situation.
On Thursday, President Vladimir Putin criticized his government’s “insufficient” efforts to deal with one of the “most serious” environmental crises of recent years.
“It was only when the scale of the disaster became too obvious to hide the terrible environmental consequences that Russian leaders began to express their so-called ‘concern,’” the spokesperson for the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said on Friday. Foreign Affairs, Georgi Tykhy, denouncing “new proof of irresponsibility” of Moscow.
