Crews from the state Department of Ecology (DOE) spent all day Monday cleaning up an oil spill on a Kent Valley wetland.
“This could take a while,” state DOE officials said on the department’s Facebook page. “We figure at least two more days to clean thick black oil from a wetland in Kent.”
State officials said the spill was reported Sunday night, but may have been there a while because oil had been there at least since the water on the city-owned wetland was at least 2 feet higher. Crews started the cleanup at 7:30 a.m. during first light.
The source of the spill remains unknown. The spill contains an estimated 300 gallons of oil over a 1.5-acre site on a 24-acre wetland owned by the city off a dead end on South 216th Street, west of Highway 167 and east of 72nd Avenue South.
“We have crews working with small skimmers and vacuums,” the DOE said. “Also trimming oiled vegetation. No bird impacts observed so far.”
State officials said wetland spills can be very complex, and sometimes some oil cannot be removed if doing so would be more harmful to habitat. After removing all that crews can, monitoring may continue for weeks.
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