Company Responsible For Ruptured Oil Pipeline Charged For OC Oil Spill

HUNTINGTON BEACH, CA — The company that owns the underwater pipeline that ruptured and spilled thousands of gallons of oil in Orange County waters October was indicted Wednesday on federal charges of illegally distributing oil, City New Service reported.

Amplify Energy Corp. and two of its subsidiaries — Beta Operating Co. and San Pedro Bay Pipeline Co. — were charged with failing to adequately respond to eight leak alarms during a 13-hour period, prosecutors said. The company is additionally charged with improperly restarting the pipeline after it had been shut down in response to the alarms.

Subscribe

The indictment filed in Los Angeles federal court charges the companies with one misdemeanor count of negligent discharge of oil. For a "corporate defendant," the charge carries a penalty of up to five years of probation, and fines that could possibly total millions of dollars, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Prosecutors said the pipeline began leaking the afternoon of Oct. 1, but the companies continued pumping oil through the line until the next morning.

The oil spill occurred after an underwater pipe ruptured and leaked roughly 30,000 gallons of oil into Orange County waters. Soon after, tarballs began washing up on Orange County shores, and residents began to notice oil sheens in the ocean water.

This triggered a 800-plus strong force of U.S. Coast Guard crews and volunteers to take to the beach in a massive cleanup effort. The leak also forced the cancellation of the popular Huntington Beach Airshow, which was already underway when the spill was noticed.

While the cleanup ensued, Orange County residents questioned what caused the oil spill to begin with, and pushes calling for an end to offshore drilling intensified across the Golden State. Orange County elected officials wondered why neither they or the public were notified of the spill sooner.

RELATED: Oil Spill Creeps South, Calls To Ban Offshore Drilling Intensify

The federal indictment alleges the companies:

• Failed to properly respond to eight alarms from an automated leak-detection system between 4:10 p.m. Oct. 1 and 5:28 a.m. Oct. 2.
• Shut down and then restarted the pipeline five times after the first five alarms were triggered, meaning oil continued flowing through the damaged line for more than three hours
• Pumped oil for three additional hours late on Oct. 1 into the early morning hours of Oct. 2 while a manual leak test was performed, despite the sixth and seventh alarms.
• Despite the eighth alarm, operated the pipeline for nearly one hour in the predawn hours of Oct. 2 after crew on a boat the company contacted failed to spot any discharged oil in the middle of the night.
• Operated the pipeline with crew members who were not adequately trained on the automated leak detection system
• Operating the pipeline with an "understaffed and fatigued crew."

More than a dozen companies doing business in the region have sued Amplify Energy Corp. for damages resulting from the spill.

City News Service contributed to this report.