Bronx River Oil Spill Cleanup Begins

While Wednesday's oil spill in the Bronx River wasn't as monumentally confounding as the Gulf disaster, workers said yesterday that the situation was a catastrophe in its own right, and that the cleanup will be a long and tedious one.

Tri-State Environmental Services worked arduously throughout the day cleaning up the serious spillage traced to a faulty heating tank at a 180-unit building in White Plains.

While the Department of Environmental Conservation remains positive regarding the clean up, the workers in the trenches were not sugarcoating the truth.

"In my opinion, I think it's pretty bad," said one worker who requested anonymity.

Maureen Wren, spokeswoman for the Department of Environmental Conservation, said: "We have cleanup being taken care of and if additional work is needed, we will take care of that."

She dispelled any rumors of the oil contaminating the surrounding mainland. "I'm not aware of anything off the river. While the cleanup is labor intensive, the volume is only 200-300 gallons, which we have controlled."

Workers could be seen throwing booms and oil absorbing mats into the surrounding water from a boat near River Road this afternoon.

"We're trying to clean as much as we can. There is a lot of oil, especially in this particular part of the area [near River Road]," said Alejandro Luna, a Tri-State employee. "We have been working nonstop and our shift ends at 9."

Antoinette Biordi, a spokeswoman from the White Plains Mayor's office, said earlier today that no news had come out regarding the spill's investigation.

"There are no updates as far as the investigation goes," said Biordi. "We're just continuing our cleanup; they'll be here for at least another week. They originally said it would take several weeks," she said, on a positive note.

In the last press release issued regarding the mess, White Plains Mayor Adam Bradley said, "The City, the County and NYS [Department of Environmental Conservation] have been working hard to make sure that the river is being cleaned up, and the wildlife population that was affected gets the proper rehabilitation needed."

The report also said the DEC, which hired Tri-State, had crews "walking along the shoreline from White Plains to Scarsdale overseeing the clean up" and that the booms placed along the riverbed were preventing the oil from spreading downstream.

The process is a slow one, but one worker assured that the clean up would be done in a timely matter.

"We got most of it clean in the upstream area, it looks good so far. The booms have been holding up well and the vacuum trucks are helping us out a lot. We are trying to continue the cleanup throughout the weekend and continue after Saturday and Sunday." said a Tri-State employee who also did not wish to be named.

While it is only the third day after the spill, time will tell the extent of damage to the wildlife in the area surrounding the Bronx River Parkway.

"I saw a kid pick up a baby duck that was coated in oil earlier, and we've only found two dead crawfish," said the worker.

County Executive Rob Astorino has promised that the cost of the remediation will not come from taxpayers' pockets, and yesterday Scarsdale Mayor Carolyn Stevens confirmed that neither the environmental cleanup nor the public worker man-hours would be paid for by the already cash-strapped village. Instead, the county will cover costs in the short-term, and it will then seek reimbursement by the building's owner.

"That makes me feel good, we shouldn't have to asborb the cost for absorbing somebody else's oil," said Stevens.

She did lament, however, that it has taken decades to restore the natural wildlife and beauty of the Bronx River preserve and expressed hope it would be resolved by the cleanup.

After commending Scarsdale fire and police response, she said, "Now it is just the question of, 'Can the county and DEC and whoever else, can they get it cleaned up?' They have responded in terms of wildlife, and they have a wildlife rescue group that is there working on it, but can they get the Bronx River back two where it was?'"