Oil spill forces 57 Marabella residents to evacuate

Fifty-sev­en res­i­dents from Mara­bel­la have so far been evac­u­at­ed fol­low­ing an oil spill in the Mara­bel­la Riv­er.

They are cur­rent­ly be­ing housed at the Roy­al Ho­tel, as Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Com­pa­ny Ltd con­tin­ues clean-up op­er­a­tions.

Guardian Me­dia was told that the com­pa­ny re­ceived a re­port about the oil spill around 10 a.m. yes­ter­day and traced the source of the leak to a 12-inch pipeline near the Bri­an Lara Sta­di­um. A Her­itage of­fi­cial said the leak has been con­tained, and clean-up op­er­a­tions are on­go­ing at var­i­ous points along the riv­er course.

San Fer­nan­do West MP and Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath, Clax­ton Bay MP Hansen Nar­i­nesingh, and coun­cil­lor John Michael Al­i­bo­cas vis­it­ed the scene. They as­sured that En­er­gy Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has been ap­prised of the sit­u­a­tion and said they are work­ing as­sid­u­ous­ly to en­sure the res­i­dents are safe and com­fort­able, and that the mat­ter is re­solved as quick­ly as pos­si­ble.