State officials are investigating how an oil spill Sunday morning at the Shenango Co. coke works on Neville Island was able to seep through a containment dike into the Ohio River.
The spilled oil escaped the diked area around the tank and found its way into a storm sewer that discharges into the river, creating a surface sheen that extended outside the company's containment boom.
Neither the state Department of Environmental Protection nor Shenango officials knew how much oil got into the water.
Nick Buchko, Shenango's environmental compliance engineer, said a pipe leading from a 30-foot-long, 10-foot-diameter tank containing an unknown amount of "holder oil" sprung a leak sometime before 10 a.m. Sunday.
The oil flowed into a diked enclosure surrounding the tank, but some of the oil seeped into an old manhole cover leading to a storm sewer that discharges directly into the river.
"We thought the manhole was sealed but some of the oil got into the sewer," Buchko said. "We're meeting to re-engineer the area and seal the sewer."
He said the holder oil, which is heavier than diesel fuel, is no longer used by the company. He said he doesn't know how much oil was in the tank, which is located in an older part of the Shenango complex originally built in 1929.
In the river, the oil got through Shenango's permanent containment boom. The company hired Weavertown Environmental Group to install another containment boom and clean up the dike and the ground around the oil tank.
Neither the DEP nor Shenango reported any fish kills as a result of the spill.
Shenango operates a 56-oven coke plant on the northern side of Neville Island. The operation employs about 200 and produces 360,000 tons of coke a year for use as fuel by steelmakers.
Don Hopey can be reached at dhopey@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1983.
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