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If going to Gran Canaria for your hols avoid this beach
Volunteers And Workers Clean Up 15 Tonnes Of Crude Oil Spilt Onto A Canary Islands Diving Beach
NEWS—CANARY ISLANDS—OIL SPILL: The scenes bring back memories of the Prestige disaster in 2002 and remind residents of the risks of prospecting for oil in the seas off the islands.
White-overalled volunteers and workers have once more been called upon to clean up a Spanish beach this week, in images that recall those seen during the Prestige disaster in Galicia in 2002.
15 tonnes of oil covering some 200 metres of a beach frequented by divers in Agüimes (Gran Canaria, Canary Islands) are being cleaned up by volunteers and workers covered in a thick, black, oily substance.
Canary Islands’ First Minister Paulino Rivero said the oil slicks: “should raise our awareness of what our coastlines mean and the damage even a small spill can do”.
Oil spills, he said: “could ruin our future by wasting one of our most precious assets: our coastline”, he said.
The spill comes at a time when there is much political debate and tension in the Canary Islands over plans to prospect for oil in the waters of the islands.
Spain’s state broadcaster, TVE, reported a series of oil slicks stretching for up to a kilometre could be seen off the coastline.
Spanish authorities are investigating the origin of the spill.
It has been suggested that the current spill originated either from a leak during a bunkering operation to transfer fuel between ships at sea, or that the oil came out of a ship’s bilges at some point.
Antonio Morales, the mayor of Agüimes, told El País that he was almost sure flora and fauna in a nearby nature reserve had not been affected.
The port chief in Las Palmas, Pedro Mederos, told the newspapers that the spill was “unpleasant” but not serious.
Environmental groups have warned that the Canary Islands do not have enough clean-up equipment to cope with a bigger spill.
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