Cleanup is focus now in Midway spill
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Science Writer
Crews on Midway Atoll have recovered close to a quarter of a massive underground jet fuel spill, but are still deciding how to handle the contaminated coral sand.
Sometime over the weekend of Feb. 8-9, approximately 82,680 gallons of fuel leaked from a corroded fitting on a fuel line, said Barbara Maxfield of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which operates Midway as a national wildlife refuge. That makes it the largest fuel spill in the Hawaiian archipelago in the past decade.
No fuel has been detected in the nearby lagoon waters, Maxfield said. "We're still optimistic that we can recover most of it," she said.
Former operators of the Midway fuel farm said that they had warned Fish and Wildlife about problems with rusting pipes and that the leak could have been detected earlier by keeping closer watch on tank levels.
"We checked our fuel levels every day," said Roger Harshbarger, who ran the facility for the Navy from 1993 to 1997, and then for Midway Phoenix until last year, when the company's contract ended. Harshbarger now lives in South Carolina.
"We figured our gain and loss on a daily basis, six days a week. It's so hard from this distance to try to figure out what went wrong, but my guess is that whoever was doing the testing wasn't doing it on a daily basis," Harshbarger said.
Maxfield said the contractor on the island checked fuel tank levels on weekdays, but the leak apparently started over a weekend. When officials detected a drop in fuel levels after the weekend, they shut off valves leading from the tank and determined the tank itself was not leaking. When they repressurized fuel lines, a significant loss was noted in an 8-inch line leading from the tank farm to a filling stand a few dozen yards away. Excavation revealed leakage from a corroded aluminum fitting on a steel 2-inch nipple extending from the fuel line.
Harshbarger said he had warned the Fish and Wildlife Service before he left the island about the need to replace the weak pipelines.
Bob Tracey, the Midway Phoenix executive overseeing Midway operations, agreed: "We hounded those people. We told them the pipelines were bad."
Midway Phoenix and the Fish and Wildlife Service parted last year on unfriendly terms, with each alleging wrongdoing by the other.
Harshbarger said that when the Navy was preparing to leave the 1,200-acre island, it removed many old fuel pipelines and an underground fuel-storage facility near the airport. But to his knowledge, the failed pipeline was not excavated or inspected in the 10 years he was on the island. The aluminum fitting that failed most likely dates to before his arrival in 1993, Harshbarger said.
Maxfield said the agency was working to clean the spill as quickly as possible, and had not yet tried to determine fault. "We're not pointing fingers," she said.
Work on the spill is being directed by its Portland-based regional environmental compliance officer, with the help of Pacific Environmental Corp., a hazardous materials cleanup firm, and GeoEngineers, which the agency had contracted to operate fuel, power, water and other systems on the atoll.
A Coast Guard plane is scheduled to deliver cleanup equipment in the next week. Crews are alternately pumping two test pits as they fill with fuel and water; an automated pumping system should be in place in about two weeks, Maxfield said.
Contaminated sand is being stockpiled and covered until a decision is made on how to clean it up.
Maxfield said test holes around the fuel spill indicate it is not spreading.
Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.
