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Ship pilot charged in San Francisco oil spill

Posted at 4:58 PM on 17 Mar 2008

The pilot of the ship that spilled more than 50,000 gallons of oil into the San Francisco Bay in November has been charged with criminal negligence, harming federally protected birds, and violating the Clean Water Act. If found guilty, Capt. John Cota could face up to 18 months in jail and more than $100,000 in fines.

source: Associated Press
see also, in Grist: Group urges Congress to ban bunker fuel in wake of S.F. oil spill

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Comments: (2 comments)

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Prevention, Prevention, Prevention!

Certainly ship pilots and skippers should be held accountable for their actions, but fining and/or jailing John Cota will do nothing to solve the systemic problems that caused the spill, which is the only way to prevent future ones.

First, as a friend and colleague said to me, so long as we have an oil economy, there will be oil spills.

Second, this spill is just another example of why we should be moving quickly and forcefully away from global trade. Thousands of birds were killed and an entire ecosystem polluted with oil just so American jerks can buy cheap crap at places like Wal-Mart and Kmart. Anyone who can look at an oiled bird and think that providing cheap junk to Americans and making a few people rich is worth the suffering and death caused by oil spills clearly lacks the morals of a decent being.

by Wolverine at 2:53 PM on 18 Mar 2008

Immediate Steps That Could Prevent Future Spills

So long as things are being shipped like this, the least that could be done would be to disallow ships to enter or leave places with significant marine hazards, like San Francisco Bay, unless visibility is above a certain, safe level.

The visibility at the time of this accident was 1/4 or 1/8 mile due to thick fog. There's no way the Cosco Busan should have been allowed to leave the dock until the fog cleared, regardless of how much the steamship company cried about the cost of remaining in port. This prioritizing of money and business over life is the root cause of this accident and spill, and is what needs to change.

by Wolverine at 2:58 PM on 18 Mar 2008

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