A sulphuric acid spill, affecting more than three kilometres of the Kingston Harbour shoreline, has left fish dead and prompted a warning from the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) for humans to stay away.

“We don’t know how far this thing will spread before it is diluted, and so we just want to put out a general alert for people to stay away from the area,” director general of ODPEM Ronald Jackson told the Sunday Observer. “(The fish killed) was enough for the team to be quite concerned and for a team to go to sea to see how far out the adverse conditions existed. The feedback is that there was quite a bit of irritation to the nose and eyes from the marine police team.”

The spill, he said occurred on Friday between 11:00 pm and 1:00 m on Friday night from a container at Berth One, of the harbour, on property owned by the Industrial Chemical Company (ICC).

It prompted the involvement of a joint response team from ODPEM, the Fire Brigade, the National Environment and Planning Agency and the Marine Police, as well as the ICC.

The full details of the spill was, up to yesterday, not immediately clear. But ODPEM said close to 300 tonnes of Sulphuric Acid were released into the sea.

“Our initial information suggests that there was a valve which was not fully secured from which the product flowed into the ICC property onto adjoining properties and into a nearby gully way which led out to the sea,” said Jackson. “As to how this occurred, we don’t have the full details. The investigation is still being conducted, both by the ICC team and the joint response team. We are still trying to go through the information and finalise that.”

NEPA said last night that water near the Greenwich Town Fishing Village was still highly acidic, and warned members of the public to stay away. But beyond not taking a dip in the water, Jackson warned Jamaicans not to harvest or eat fish from the affected area. People will be told when it is safe to do so, he said.

“The NEPA guys and probably the Ministry of Health and the guys who do water testing will probably do water samples and we will see,” Jackson said.

As to the clean-up efforts, Jackson said: “For the on-land component, they used marl which neutralised the product on land and then they took that to the landfill to dispose of. On water, what we know is that water usually dilutes the product (chemical).”

“It is very difficulty for sulphuric acid to be contained using the traditional oil spill equipment like your booms and so on. So what the team advised was that they were looking at the possibility of it being naturally diluted by the sea. However, that has not gone as quickly as we anticipated. That is why we are advising people not to go there until the process is done,” the ODPEM boss added.

Meanwhile, environmental lobbyists said the spill and its effects on marine and human life was a wake up call to take better care of the environment.

“This is very serious, whether it is diluted or concentrated sulphuric acid,” said Peter Espeut, former head of the Caribbean Coastal Area Management Foundation and the holder of a first degree in Chemistry. “If it is concentrated it is worse. When concentrated sulphuric acid hits water it generates a lot of heat. Sulphuric acid is very corrosive. If you, for example, have a boat or a metal-hull ship and the spill took place around the ship, the ship would more than likely sink. It would bore a hole in the ship – if it is concentrated. Maybe the good news is that there is not much alive in Kingston Harbour anymore.”

Still, he said that the company responsible ought to be held accountable.

“I am very disturbed to hear about it,” said Wendy Lee, president of the Northern Jamaica Conservation Association.

“We need to pay more attention to the protection of the environment. We are not paying enough attention. I am numb almost to hearing all the destruction I see and hear about. It seems like all our efforts over the years to raise awareness and to get the Government to take environmental protection seriously have been fruitless,” she added.

“Poor Kingston Harbour,” was the immediate response of Diana McCaulay, executive director of the Jamaica Environment Trust, when contacted for comment yesterday. “What is there to say? We just don’t pay attention to these things. It sounds like an accident but accidents are sometimes very serious.”

She suggested that the incident ought to be seen as an opportunity to once again put the spotlight on the long polluted Kingston Harbour and its potential for contributing significantly to Jamaica’s socio-economic development.

“Kingston Harbour has been studied to death and the biggest type of pollution is sewage. There was an economic evaluation done on what Kingston harbour would be worth if it was restored, including livelihoods and recreation and it was hundreds of millions of dollars. So a restored Kingston Harbour has great economic benefit and we just don’t seem to be able to get around to doing that,” McCaulay told the Sunday Observer.

As to Friday night’s spill, she said greater care needed to be taken to store hazardous material.

“In terms of containers storing hazardous material, they should always be in some bunded area, which is like a little hill. So you put it around the area where you have hazardous material so if there is spill, it is contained in that area. That should be a standard part of any port operation. Spills do happen, and what you want to do is contain them,” she said.