At 1005hrs on March 22, 2010, Caterpillar Summerville Operations in Summerville, South Carolina, reported a release of automatic transmission fluid (ATF) from a broken pump at the top of an 8000-gal tank. The release began sometime between 0430hrs and 0530hrs when the pump was turned on and was not discovered until after 0600hrs during daylight. Facility employees responded to the release by turning off the pump then trapping oil at drains, outlets, and an unname creek using sorbent boom and oil pads. Response contractor Moran Environmental was brought on site to perform the sleanup. The initial estimate reported a loss of 3500-gal but later calculations placed the loss at 2000-gal with approximately 50% of the product captured by secondary containment. Product that spilled outside of the containment fell onto both soil and pavement, then drained to two inlets which travel approximately 190-feet to a 0.7-acre retention pond. The spill then flowed across surface waters of the pond, then along a 3-foot wide unnamed creek for approximately 950-feet where it was boomed several times (total length traveled = 1300-feet).
On March 22, responders from both SCDHEC and EPA visited the site to meet with facility personnel and oversee response operations. SCDHEC and EPA both determined that current response activities were satisfactory. SCDHEC demobilized from the Site on March 22; EPA conducted an SPCC inspection on and demobilized from the Site on March 23.
