By GENE KEMMETER
of The Gazette
Cleanup efforts continue for a fuel leak at the Stevens Point Municipal Airport.
"There's not a lot of movement toward ground water," said Stevens Point Mayor Gary Wescott. "This spill did not get ahead of us. We reacted quickly to it. The day of the spill we already had recovery efforts under way."
Kyle Wagoner, project manager with Earth Tech, the engineering consultant for cleanup of the spill, said the spill covers a circular area of about 60 to 70 feet in diameter and initial borings showed it went down about 18 feet.
"I think it's a relatively small area, particularly compared to the airport size," he said about the contamination.
Crews excavated soil from the area and placed it on plastic containment sheets. "That pile is about 600 cubic yards of soil," Wagoner said. "We'll be working on a plan soon to remove the soil from the site for off-site treatment. More likely it will be sent to a treatment facility within a month."
After excavating the soil, he said crews filled the hole with pea gravel and installed a 12-inch sump pump to recover fuel and any contaminated ground water.
Wagoner said crews have recovered about 3,000 gallons of fuel oil through pumping, plus another 1,000 to 1,500 gallons in the excavated soil. Approximately 6,600 gallons leaked from a tank last Wednesday, Aug. 27.
The pump continues to pull fuel from the hole, he said, adding that the initial excavation of soil resembled someone trying to excavate soup.
"We'll be pumping to try to recover fuel for several more months, probably right into the start of winter. Then we'll have to assess where we're at," he said. The pump, he explained, draws any liquid in the soil toward it, so what's ever there will be extracted.
"When we see we are no longer recovering any fuel by pumping, then we'll have to decide what other cleanup method is necessary."
Wescott said he expects monitoring of the site to last about a year. "The DNR (state Department of Natural Resources) will require one year of monitoring."
As far as the cleanup costs, he said he hopes to have an update for the aldermen at city committee meetings on Monday, Sept. 8, along with additional information.