City Gas and Transmission Corporation; Wilmington, North Carolina

Wilmington, North Carolina | 1991-Nov-15

Initial Notification: In March 1991, USCG MSO Wilmington personnel saw oily black material leaching into the water from the north bank of the drainage canal. The canal drains directly to the Cape Fear River constituting discharge of oil into U.S. waters. Monitoring wells were placed near the site of the leaching to determine the extent and source of the plume. Analysis of the groundwater monitoring data revealed a plume of oil that stretched from the site of leaching upslope below a nearby pump pit and below the nearest storage tank (tank 13). MSO Wilmington is responding to an oil pollution incident at the City Gas and Transmission Corp., Wilmington, NC, an abandoned oil and waste oil facility. Oil is leaking at a low rate into a drainage ditch and then into the Cape Fear River. The responsible party has also terminated maintenance of a recovery well located about five feet from the edge of the drainage ditch. Pumps had been used to remove floating oil from the well while depressing the local ground water level . This had prevented oil from leaching into the drainage ditch. The facility has approximately 15-20 tanks with concrete bottoms. Some sludges in 55 gallon drums have been observed on the site. Oil contamination of soils and potential contamination of underground waters has been estimated as high as 100,000 gallons. (the methods used for this estimate are not known). MSO Wilmington has requested on-site support from the NOAA SSC. A NOAA proposal to perform preliminary assessments has been approved. USCG district 5. Keyword: bioremediation, sorbent booms, sorbent pads, chemical characterization, AST, groundwater contamination, monitoring wells, French drain, COIL, remediation, information management.