Spanish King to Visit Sullied Coast as Winds Push Oil Ashore
Juan Carlos, making his first tour of the region since the sinking of the Prestige tanker on November 19, will visit beaches at Laxe and Muxia, some 100 kilometers (60 miles) and 150 kilometers southwest respectively down the Galician coast from La Coruna.
The King, accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and Manuel Fraga, the head of the regional Galicia government, will also observe cleanup efforts and meet representatives of the region's hard-hit fishing industry.
The stretch of several hundred kilometers of polluted coast runs between La Coruna in the north and Cape Finisterre further south, with 164 beaches affected, according to the latest government count Sunday, AFP reported.
The Prestige, an aging Liberian-registered flying a Bahamas flag and carrying 77,000 tons of heavy fuel oil, broke down in rough seas on November 13. It has since spilled an estimated 10,000 to 20,000 tons into the sea, according to different sources.
Continued storms whipped up winds between 35-45 kilometers per hour, pushing small slicks directly onto the already blackened beaches and frustrating cleanup efforts of a battery of anti-pollution vessels which have tried to form a barrier off the coast.
The specialized vessels from Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Norway, stationed along a 500-kilometer stretch of ocean, have been unable to reach the remaining major slick, currently floating around 30 kilometers out. They have so far pumped some 5,500 tons from the sea.
New Vessels from Britain, Denmark and Italy are expected on Monday and Tuesday to join the cleanup efforts.
Meanwhile, the environmental catastrophe continued to mount, as a baby dolphin washed up near Cape Tourinan after having suffocated in the fuel.
It is the first marine mammal casualty from the oil spill, although up to 15,000 sea birds are already reported dead.