UNITED STATES: While cleaning workers toiled in near-freezing temperatures and investigators looked for signs of what caused the spill, residents nearby the scene of the worst U.S. oil pipeline leak in a decade accepted the commotion and smell.
A muddy site on the outskirts of this farming village, where a leak in the Keystone pipeline discovered on Wednesday spewed 14,000 barrels of oil, was where tractor trucks transported generators, lighting, and ground mats while a strong oil stink hovered in the air.
The operator of the pipeline TC Energy, announced on Friday that it was considering restarting the line, which transports 622,000 barrels of Canadian oil per day to refineries and export hubs in the United States.
Dana Cecrle, a Washington resident, said, “We could smell it first thing in the morning; it was bad,” she continued by stating, “Stuff breaks. Pipelines break, oil trains derail.”
When a restart on the damaged segment could start, TC Energy did not specify the specifics of the breach or give a start date.
Randy Hubbard, the disaster preparedness coordinator for Washington County, announced on Saturday that officials would be briefed on the pipeline breach and cleanup on Monday.
Federal officials examined the scene to determine what caused the 36-inch (91-cm) pipeline to burst as environmental experts from as far away as Mississippi assisted with the cleanup.
Roughly 200 miles (322 km) northwest of Kansas City is the rural community of Washington County, which has a population of about 5,500.
The water supply is not in danger, and no residents have been ordered to leave because of the spill.
As oil spilled into a creek and sprayed onto a hillside close to a pasture for livestock, emergency personnel installed booms to contain the situation, according to Hubbard.
According to sources, TC Energy plans to restart a pipeline segment that transports oil to Illinois on Saturday and another segment that transports oil to the important trading hub of Cushing, Oklahoma, on December 20.
Since the pipeline’s opening in 2010, there have been three spills involving several thousand barrels of crude on its 2,687-mile (4,324 km) lengths. The pipeline had previously been closed for about two weeks due to a Keystone spill.
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