On Sunday March 23, 2008, at approximately 5:00 am CDT, workers at the Koch Pipeline facility in Clearbrook, Minnesota noticed a pipeline rupture. Reportedly, a 6 inch pipe containing crude oil had cracked near a weld at the tank due to repeated thawing and freezing. The pipe came from the tank and went into the ground. An estimated 1,700 barrels of crude oil were released into the bermed area surrounding the 150,000 drum storage tank. The facility contracted with Oil Service Inc. (OSI) to vacuum / recover the crude oil from the bermed area. The EPA START contractor was mobilized to the site on the afternoon of March 23, 2008.
During the morning of Monday March 24, 2008, the EPA START contractor met with the facility representative out of Minneapolis, Minnesota, Scott Neujahr, and Doug Bellefeuille, the MPCA responder out of the Detroit Lakes, Minnesota office. By noon on Monday March 24, 2008, approximately 1,400 barrels of crude oil had been recovered by the vacuum trucks. The facility contact anticipated that approximately 25% of the volume recovered was actually water and that the majority of the free product would be recovered by nightfall. A water drain that leads outside of the bermed area was plugged. The drain pipe is valved and the valve had been closed before the spill occurred. The drain will be boomed on both sides and will be cleaned out on Tuesday March 25, 2008. No obvious release was noted anywhere outside of the bermed area. No release to navigable water was noted.
Doug Bellefeuille, MPCA, plans to return to the scene later this week to check on the progress of the clean up.
Koch Pipeline Co. is performing clean-up activities as described above.
No further action anticipated.
None at this time.
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