Refinery Refuses to Take Blame for Oil Spill

Golden West Refinery Co., owner of the mooring off Huntington Beach where a tanker ran aground and spilled 397,000 gallons of oil in February, on Friday disputed the U.S. Coast Guard’s conclusion that the company was partly to blame for the accident.

In the company’s first response to the report, Roger Kemple, Golden West vice president, said in a prepared statement that if anyone is to blame for the accident, it is the mooring master and the ship’s captain. A mooring master is an independent local captain hired by vessel operators to guide large ships to offshore moorings.

“The decision to attempt to berth the vessel American Trader in the weather, sea and tidal conditions on the date of the accident was made by the mooring master and the captain of the American Trader, and not by Golden West,” the release stated.

The spill occurred Feb. 7 as the American Trader approached a cluster of Golden West moorings so that it could discharge 300,000 barrels of oil into a pipeline to the company’s marine terminal in Huntington Beach. The oil ultimately was to have gone to the company’s refinery in Santa Fe Springs.

As the tanker drew close to the mooring, it dropped two anchors. The Coast Guard believes that the tanker ran aground on its port anchor, rupturing the ship’s hull and sending oil gushing into the water.

In a report released Wednesday, the Coast Guard said the accident occurred partly because Golden West failed to regularly survey the depth of the water surrounding its moorings.

The Coast Guard report also said that a second cause was the failure of the mooring master, Capt. John Keon, 41, of San Jacinto, “to be fully cognizant of the accurate sea berth water depth information.”

The Coast Guard concluded that the ship’s crew and captain, A.W. LaWare, were not at fault.

Golden West officials said Friday that “water depth in and around the sea berth has remained stable, and there was no change in water depth that caused or contributed to the accident.” Furthermore, they said, “correct water depth information was available to and should have been known by the mooring masters at the time of the spill.”

“The navigational decision to bring the ship in under those tidal and sea conditions was made by Capts. Keon and LaWare, not by Golden West,” their statement said.

Keon could not be reached for comment.

From his home in Houston, LaWare said: “I find no fault with the findings of the U.S. Coast Guard in their report. I have no comment on the rebuttal from Golden West.”

Capt. James C. Card, commander of the 11th Coast Guard District, which has its headquarters in Long Beach, said that Golden West’s statement did not seem to shed new light on the matter.

“We tried to gather all the information that was available to us at the time, including who knew what when and how they knew it, and drew our conclusions from that,” he said. “Our conclusions could change if any new information were to be brought to us, but I don’t think that’s the case here.”

The Coast Guard concluded that neither Golden West nor Keon violated any federal laws “for which the Coast Guard has enforcement responsibility.”