(Albany television station Capitol News 9 posted the following story by Chris Hamilton on its website on May 26.)
ALBANY, N.Y. — Crews from an environmental cleanup company are continuing to collect 25,000 or so gallons of oil off the western shore of Lake Champlain.
Daniel Sherwood from OP-Tech of Plattsburgh said, “We’re skimming it up with oil skimmers and oil absorbents, and trying to remove the bulk of the oil.”
Early Monday morning, several cars of a southbound Canadian Pacific railroad train came off the tracks just south of Fort Ticonderoga.
Ray Thatcher, Director of Emergency Services in Essex County said, “There was a train incident with a derailment, with the cars still upright.”
Canadian Pacific has hired OP-Tech of Plattsburgh to clean up the spill. Company officials said the cleanup should take about three to four weeks to complete. They expect to collect about 90 percent of the oil.
Sherwood said, “It’s not a difficult oil to work with, it’s just there’s a good quantity. It’s encapsulated, it’s captured, it’s just a matter of picking it up, and taking it away.”
The DEC is overseeing the cleanup and said the environmental damage is expected to be minimal, although it could possibly harm animals like frogs and salamanders.