Oil leak from 20-year-old shipwreck threatens Panglao

Panglao Island. AFP FILE PHOTO

TAGBILARAN CITY, Philippines—More than a week after the 7.2 magnitude earthquake devastated the province of Bohol, the adjacent island of Panglao that is home to many beach and diving resorts  is threatened by bunker fuel leaking out of a ship that sank 20 years ago.

Between 60 to 100 liters of diesel was estimated to have leaked  from the wreckage of the M/V Wilcon, causing an oil sheen 50 meters long and 25 meters wide.

M/V Wilcon, a cargo ship with a gross tonnage of 4,210, sank off Panglao island in 1994 after it caught fire. The vessel went down in 150-meter-deep waters off  Panglao, and the October 15 earthquake is believed to have caused the fuel in its holds to ooze.

Bohol GovernorEdgar Chatto said the Philippine Coast Guard reported at Thursday’s meeting of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council that the oil spill was first sighted on October 19.

“I told the Coast Guard that you have limited capability to handle this problem. It has to be raised already to the higher levels so that appropriate remedial measures can be done,” Chatto said at a press briefing at the People’s Mansion Friday morning.

The governor  ordered the Coast Guard in Bohol to assess the extent of the oil spill.

The Coast Guard chief in Bohol,  Cmdr. Agapito Bibat, told the Inquirer in a telephone interview that he, along with Marine Environment Protection personnel, was in the area to see what they could do about the oil spill.

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Meanwhile, the search for more fatalities from the earthquake continued Friday, especially in Sagbayan where five children were buried when the Bayong Falls collapsed on them while they were bathing there when the earthquake struck past 8 a.m.

In Balilihan town, the bodies of two persons buried in the rubble of their homes were recovered by a group of soldiers, policemen and civilian volunteers.

Capt.  Omar Wynn Gonato, commanding officer of the 4th Special Forces Company of the Philippine Army, said the bodies of Patricio Quinio, 46, and Genaro Manatad, 76, were recovered in barangay Cogon.

The recovery of the bodies brought the official death toll in Bohol to 187 as of 8 a.m. Friday. At least 626 people were injured and 10 remain more remain missing.

Structural engineers, together with municipal engineers of local government units, are now checking the structural integrity of damaged houses.

President Benigno Aquino, in a visit on Thursday, ordered the Department of Public Works and Highways to conduct a survey of houses damaged  with the assistance of the local government units.

During the media briefing, Chatto said that he has tasked engineers to check the structural integrity of school buildings in time for the November 5 resumption of classes in the province.

The office of the Department of Education in the province reported that a total of 230 schools were destroyed.

“Every school must be validated and must be fit for occupancy before the children and teachers enter these,” Chatto said.

Chatto added that they would have to look for alternative places to hold classes in places where the schools were destroyed. They were  considering the use of tents, barangay halls and chapels  as temporary classrooms.

He also disclosed that additional shelter boxes and tents had arrived and were ready for distribution to the evacuees.

Power was expected to be fully restored by October 30.

In Maribojoc, Antequera, Loon and Sagbayan, electricity was available only in the town centers.

The repacking of relief goods was also going on at a faster pace, Chatto said, adding that alternate routes were established to speed up their distribution.