Super sucker pumps were deployed for the oil slick clean-up operations at Ramakrishna Nagar Kuppam off Ernavur junction on Saturday. The pumps collected 9,000 litres of oil-water mix. The oil sludge and tar contaminated various beaches along the city’s coastline after an oil leak following the collision of two cargo-carrying ships off the Kamarajar Port on January 28.
Earlier this week, the pumps were unable to function since the oil content in the sludge was more. But with over 1,200 volunteers removing the oil sludge in buckets over the past six days, the thickness of the oil had come down, State Fisheries Minister D. Jayakumar told reporters.
Working throughout the day, teams of personnel from various government departments and volunteers collected 30 tonnes of oil sludge and 11 tonnes of oil-sand mix from the affected areas along the coastline of Chennai, Tiruvallur and Kancheepuram districts.
Since the beginning of the clean-up, 121 tonnes of oil sludge, 65 tonnes of oil-sand mix and 72,000 litres of oil-water mix had been removed, said a press release from the Coast Guard.
The tar globules at various beaches too have been removed. At Neelankarai, sources said that some persons, who had cleared the beach yesterday, had buried the tar forcing volunteers to dig up the top soil at several locations.
The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board has been collecting seawater samples from various spots along the coast. The samples have been sent to a Central government laboratory at Ambattur and are being checked for total organic compounds, total petroleum hydrocarbons and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (these are carcinogenic in nature).
