Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin, has declared a national emergency after it sees the worst oil spill in a river in the history of mankind. As per the reports, at least 20,000 tonnes of diesel oil has leaked into a river within the Arctic Circle in Russia.
The spill happened when a fuel tank at a power plant near the Siberian city of Norilsk collapsed last Friday. The power plant company said that one of the legs of the oil tanker holding the same had collapsed causing the oil leakage.
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The plant is owned by a subsidiary of Norilsk Nickel, which is the world’s leading nickel and palladium producer. The director of the power plant has been taken into custody but no case has been filed against him yet.
The oil flowed into the Ambarnaya River and turned a 7.5-mile stretch crimson. The river feeds Lake Pyasino that flows into another river that leads to the Arctic Ocean. The oil also contaminated the Daldykan River.
An environment specialist believes that the clean-up could take between five and 10 years and cost 100 billion roubles ($1.5 billion).
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The accident is the second-largest in modern Russian history in terms of volume, an expert from the World Wildlife Fund, Alexei Knizhnikov, told the AFP news agency.