Sasha Wil­son

What caused a four-inch oil line in "ex­cel­lent con­di­tion" to rup­ture at Rock Riv­er, Moru­ga, on Christ­mas Eve is en­gag­ing the at­ten­tion of of­fi­cials from Neal and Massy En­er­gy Re­sources Ltd.And de­spite the pun­gent fumes, res­i­dents said they were not ad­verse­ly af­fect­ed and were able to en­joy their Christ­mas.This is the sixth oil leak with­in two weeks–the first five oc­cur­ring along the south-west­ern coast­line, caus­ing hav­oc to the lives of res­i­dents and on the en­vi­ron­ment.

Petrotrin of­fi­cials claimed sab­o­tage, but the Oil­fields Work­ers' Trade Union coun­tered that poor main­te­nance was to blame.When T&T Guardian vis­it­ed the com­mu­ni­ty yes­ter­day, there was a high scent of hy­dro­car­bon and small de­posits of oil were vis­i­ble in the riv­er. Sev­er­al dead fish were seen float­ing in the riv­er.Clean-up op­er­a­tions were al­so in progress.

Rudranath Dookran, op­er­a­tions man­ag­er of Neal and Massy En­er­gy Re­sources Ltd, said the rup­tured line be­longed to his com­pa­ny.He ex­plained that the com­pa­ny was in a joint ven­ture op­er­a­tion with Petrotrin.On Tues­day around mid­day, he said, a four-inch trans­fer line, run­ning from the com­pa­ny to Petrotrin's main trunk line, rup­tured.

"The cause is yet to be as­cer­tained. We are still in­ves­ti­gat­ing." When asked whether the com­pa­ny sus­pect­ed sab­o­tage, he said, "I don't want to com­ment on that. There is a lot of talk about sab­o­tage go­ing around, it is be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed."He said, "It was an old line but in ex­cel­lent con­di­tion."Dookran said they had re­paired the leak, but be­cause of the flood caused by heavy rain, the oil got in­to the riv­er and wa­ter cours­es. How­ev­er, he as­sured that it was con­tained and lo­calised to that spe­cif­ic area.

He said no one com­plained about feel­ing ill and no crops or prop­er­ty were de­stroyed. "This is minis­cule com­pared to what's hap­pen­ing else­where."Res­i­dents were al­so hired to as­sist in the clean-up op­er­a­tions. Res­i­dent Kei­th Noel said every­thing was "cool." "We did not have any ma­jor prob­lem. No­body is sick. We call­ing and every­thing." An­oth­er res­i­dent said he was sat­is­fied with the re­sponse.Dookran was op­ti­mistic by to­day the scent would dis­si­pate and clean-up op­er­a­tions will com­plet­ed.

Moru­ga MP Clifton de Coteau said the sit­u­a­tion im­proved since Wednes­day. "The oil flow is not as thick in the riv­er." How­ev­er, he said there was need for clean-up op­er­a­tions along the river­bank and some res­i­dents com­plained about the fumes.The min­is­ter was ex­pect­ed to have vis­it­ed res­i­dents around 5 pm last evening.

At a press con­fer­ence at OW­TU's head­quar­ters in San Fer­nan­do, yes­ter­day, OW­TU pres­i­dent gen­er­al An­cel Ro­get said the union re­ceived a re­port on the in­ci­dent yes­ter­day morn­ing, but were not able to get any specifics.He as­sured, how­ev­er, that the union will close­ly in­ves­ti­gate the na­ture of the leak and what mea­sures were put in place to con­tain it.