BBC News-China Struggles With Homegrown Oil Spill

photo courtesy of greenfudge.org

(story reported by Chris Hoag)

An army of volunteers and fishermen has been mobilised to help clean up the pollution from the area around the port of Dalian, one of China's most important strategic oil reserves.

But conditions are grim for those involved.

The scene at a small harbour where they are collecting the oil is like something out of the 19th Century.

Fishermen covered in oil, some of them working just in their underwear, scrape up the toxic sludge that spilled out of the jars they have brought back from the open sea.

No one is wearing protective goggles, facemasks or even gloves to protect them from the hazardous chemicals in the oil.

It takes them four or five hours to sail back from where they collect the oil on the open sea.

They have to wait until nightfall, when the temperature drops, and the oil is at its most viscous, to scoop it out.

(click here to read Chris Hoag's entire BBC News story)