Rush to clean major oil spill from Shell field off Nigeria

AFP

22 December 2011

Rush to clean major oil spill from Shell field off Nigeria

LAGOS — Authorities rushed to prevent one of Nigeria's worst recent oil spills from reaching the West African nation's shoreline on Thursday, with production from a major Shell field also shut due to the leak.

Shell, which said the leak has been stopped, has estimated that less than 40,000 barrels of crude have spilled into the sea and deployed ships with dispersants to attack the slick. Planes were also being mobilised.

It was Nigeria's worst offshore spill since a 1998 Mobil incident, officials said, though onshore leaks have been estimated at levels far worse since that time in the oil-producing Niger Delta.

"It's about the same level with what happened in 1998 with the Mobil oil spill," said Peter Idabor, head of the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency.

"The oil slicks went down the whole coast line and beyond Nigeria's borders."