VANCOUVER(AFP) - A major pipeline broke near a busy port in Canada Tuesday, spewing thousands of litres of crude oil and causing homes to be evacuated amid environmental fears, local authorities said.
The breach sent oil spilling into an ocean inlet near the Port of Vancouver, after a backhoe digging device hit a major pipeline in a residential neighbourhood.
More than 100 homes were evacuated after crude oil spouted as high as a 10-storey building in the city of Burnaby, a suburb of this western Canadian metropolis, said Burnaby mayor Derek Corrigan.
"The good thing is nobody was hurt," Corrigan told AFP. "We've got some environmental damage."
Oil spouted from the 24-inch pipeline for 90 minutes before it was contained, on a hill about 500 meters above the shore. Witnesses on local media reports described "a river" of oil flowing into nearby Burrard Inlet.
"You're talking in thousands of liters," Corrigan said.
Environment experts were assessing damage from the spill.
"It's a serious spill, concerning environmental damage," Corrigan said. "Any oil into Burrard Inlet is too much."
The pipeline, owned by Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, carries oil to a storage and transfer facility on the shores of the inlet. Equipment owned by a local contractor ruptured it while digging up a road.
City officials closed a nearby pumping station, and emergency crews deployed barriers on the water to contain the spill, said Corrigan.
"Now all the parties are going to try and sort out whose responsibility it was," he said.
The pipeline should have been on a map used by all backhoe operators, he said, but added preliminary information suggested "the map didn't correctly depict where the pipeline was."