Large oil spill near North Sea oil platform: Norway

0 Comments | AFP, December, 2007

OSLO (AFP) — Thousands of tonnes of oil poured into the North Sea Wednesday as it was being piped from an offshore platform to a loading buoy, Norwegian authorities and the platform's operator said.

A plane, a helicopter and boats were scrambled to the scene in the Statfjord oilfield, some 200 kilometres (125 miles) from the Norwegian coast, to determine the extent of the spill and try to contain it, operator StatoilHydro said.

"There was a very large spill while transhipping oil from the platform to a ship," Inger Anda, a spokeswoman for the Petroleum Safety Authority Norway, told AFP.

According to preliminary estimates from the Petroleum Safety Authority, some 3,840 cubic metres, the equivalent of 24,150 barrels or 3,220 tonnes of oil, had spilled into the...