McGrath Lake Spill; McGrath Lake, Ventura, California

McGrath Lake, Ventura, California | 1993-Dec-25

Initial Notification: On the morning of December 25, 1993, a failure of a pipeline belonging to Berry Petroleum was reported. The failure occurred below the ground near a pipe junction on the east side of Harbor Boulevard just south of Ventura, California. Approximately 2,000 barrels of a heavy crude produced from a local field, percolated through the ground to the west and underneath the road. The oil surfaced 50 yards west of Harbor Boulevard and entered a creek, traveled along this creek approximately 150 yards to the south where it entered McGrath Lake. McGrath is a freshwater lake (approximately 800 by 100 yards) situated amongst medium-coarse grained sand dunes and is located 100 to 200 yards inshore of the intertidal zone. The lake serves as a drainage basin for the surrounding agricultural fields and has no natural communication with the ocean. To control the lake level, water is routinely pumped out of the lake and into the Pacific Ocean through a pipeline running through the dunes and onto the beach. When the oil entered the lake, the pump was on and oil was discharged onto the sand beach and into the nearshore environment. Less than 100 barrels of oil entered the ocean; the majority was contained in the lake, the creek, or was saturated in the sediment. The mouth of the Santa Clara river was bermed to prevent oil from entering the estuary. To control the amount of water flowing through the spill site, water was diverted from the creek to the Santa Clara River via pumps. Underflow dams and filter fences with sorbent pompoms were installed along the creek. The vegetated shoreline of the creek and the lake, consisting mostly of tules, was heavily coated with oil. Because all pumping operations had ceased, the water level in the lake was rising and began covering over already impacted shoreline and affecting more habitat as it rose. After consulting with the Regional Water Quality Control Board, pumping the lake into the ocean began again and the water level was lowered to where it had been before the spill. USCG district 11. Keyword: containment boom, International Bird Rescue Research Center, propane cannons, shallow water recovery, siphon dams, skimmers, sorbent boom, sorbent pompoms, tule, vacuum trucks, vegetation cutting, volunteers, weed cutters, weir/pump skimmer.