ANCHORAGE - A tugboat put in service to help prevent another oil spill disaster in Prince William Sound ran aground on the same reef as the Exxon Valdez 20 years ago in what remains the nation’s worst oil spill.
The Coast Guard said yesterday that the 136-foot tug with six crew aboard had just completed an ice survey and was heading back to port in Valdez when it grounded on Bligh Reef.
The tug reported the grounding in a radio call at 6:15 p.m. Wednesday.
Two of the tug’s fuel tanks were damaged. The tanks contained an estimated 33,500 gallons of diesel fuel, about a quarter of their capacity.
The Coast Guard said a fuel sheen about 3 miles long and 30 yards wide drifted away from the vessel. There was no sheen visible around the tug. An oil response vessel had arrived and was skimming the water near the sheen yesterday afternoon.
Officials say diesel fuel is much lighter than crude oil and will evaporate.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Jon-Paul Rios said the tug’s crew quickly deployed 200 feet of fuel containment booms around the vessel after clearing the reef and continuing to deeper waters.
“We jumped on this pretty fast due to the Exxon Valdez and the training we got from that,’’ he said.
A dive team conducting a hull inspection found extensive damage to the Crowley Marine Services tug. Also, a 4- to 5-foot section of the keel was missing.
The tug, called the Pathfinder, is part of the Ship Escort Response Vessel System - the system that was put in place following the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster when the 987-foot tanker ran aground on the same reef and spilled nearly 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound.