Oil has spilled into the Tulva River in the Osinsky district of the Perm Territory, ITAR-TASS reports. According to information provided to Itar-Tass by the LUKoil oil company, the incident was caused by a rupture in the Mayak-Osa oil pipeline, which belongs to the company, Itar-Tass.
The incident happened at around 16:00, Moscow time (12:00 GMT) on Tuesday, May 13. As a result of the pipeline rupture, 0.8 cubic metres of oil and oil-containing products got into water and soil, the company officials said.
However, according to the Perm rescue emergency-team that arrived at the incident site, the data provided by the pipeline’s owners were considerably underestimated. According to the experts, up to 10 tonnes of oil-containing products might have been discharged into the water.
By 17:00, Moscow time (13:00 GMT) pressure on the (damaged) section of the pipeline was switched off, and the discharge of poisonous substances stopped. A group of experts has been setting up booms on the scene.
“A total of three kilometres of the river banks have been examined in the pipeline rupture zone; the banks are polluted, the oil slick is everywhere. One can see from the banks that fish, which are about to spawn, are suffocating and dying,” a member of the Perm emergency team, Alexei Dudarev, told Itar-Tass.
Experts from the main department of the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry for the Perm territory, who also arrived at the incident site, said that oil had spilled not only into the Tulva River; a significant part of the oil had already got into the Kama River as well. The incident may pose a serious threat to the people from nearby villages because the poisoned water will approach the territory of water intakes, the Emergencies Ministry said.