NT-3165

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wide shot New York Statue of Liberty - pan out, cars parked on bridge

Bird flying over ocean

Funding for the show by announcer and overlay The Eleventh Hour graphic.

Host Robert Lipsyte in the studio at his desk welcomes viewers to the show and introduces himself.

Lipsyte cuts to a report about the New York shoreline.

Large vessel docked in New York harbor

Close up pan showing a crowded area in the harbor with large moored tankers and ships - a smaller tug in the middle.

Another map with a hypothetical rendering of what it would look like if two oil tankers collided in between Staten Island and the Verrazano Narrows Bridge.

Seagulls flying high in the sky

Dery Bennett, American Littoral Society talking with unseen unknown interviewer along the New York harbor coastline about the potential tragic effects should there be an oil spill that gets into a salt marsh. He states that when and if it happens New York will not be prepared for it.

Clean Harbor tug boat moving slowly through New York Harbor as Robert Lipsyte narrates about the oil industry and the size of the spill in Alaska.

Clean Harbors tug sailing past the huge oil tanks in New York Harbor

Dery Bennett speaking about the oil industry's plan in case of an oil spill in New York Harbor - he is convinced the plan will only work in part with most of the oil escaping and getting into the eco system

wide shots and pan of the oil tanks and equipment along the New York Harbor

Pan along the side wall of a huge oil tanker

A U.S. Coast Guard boat chugging through New York Harbor waters.

bottom side view of a large orange vessel moored with huge chain. Other ships can be seen in bkgd.

Commander Softye talks about coverage concerns should there be more collisions or happenings.

The Eleventh Hour graphic.

An oil barge and small tug boat on a foggy day in New Jersey, three men in foreground talking amongst themselves

The Eleventh Hour Graphic

INTERVIEW

Robert Lipsyte:
We've seen a lot of birds over the years with with oil on their backs. But we have the sense that this time around, we could be the sitting ducks here in New York Harbor. Oh, what's government going to do about it in light of what's happened up in Alaska?

Nita Lowey
I'm particularly concerned about who's driving those tankers. During the hearing. It came out in fact, it was my question that Captain Hazelwood had been denied a driving license in New York three times he had been without a driving license since November. And yet he was given the responsibility of driving this 60 million gallon tanker. I think what we really have to focus on is our licensing requirements at the present time. You have to get your license renewed every five years. This all happened to him within the last four years

Robert Lipsyte
As important as this is and I think it's very important. I'm I'm a little leery of this idea of saying it's human error and blaming it on one drunken captain, because it seems like there's a system that's not in place. It seems to me that well, for example, Captain north from things that we've heard, you guys are not getting as much money as you need and you've had a cut back on your effectiveness and not do the job that you want to do. Is that true?

Robert North
Well, in 1988, we had a budget reduction and they at nine we've received the budget that we asked for in 1990. Looks hopeful as well. So the cutbacks that we initiated in terms of active patrols in 88, we've re instituted

Robert Lipsyte
but what about those dockworkers in Woodbridge New Jersey who don't see your guys so much anymore? When the cops aren't around you speed

Robert North
My people or their conduct harbor patrols as we have in the past we inspect facilities we board the vessels as they point

Robert Lipsyte
so we have nothing to worry about New York Harbor

Robert North
we always have a risk certainly we have a number of prevention programs that we exercise to minimize that risk which includes inspection of the vessels the facilities harbor patrols to find all spills when they occur

Robert Lipsyte
And the radar was cut back I mean, you don't have the radar that you used to have

Robert North
The vessel traffic service was reduced to the point that I have one radar that monitors upper bay averages but it does not provide information to traffic.

Robert Lipsyte
Is that something that you need.

Robert North
It's helpful

Robert Lipsyte
does it increase the risk?

Robert North
If you had better coverage, the harbor and traffic information to provide the mariners it may decrease the risk

Robert Lipsyte
Because what's what scares me is this this this channel is really the New Jersey Turnpike of ships. And I know that when I drive on the New Jersey Turnpike, if I don't see you know, cops around, like everybody else, I'll go a little faster. Do you think that the Coast Guard needs more money?

Nita Lowey
Oh, absolutely. And the real problem that we have in Washington and I'm on the Coast Guard subcommittee of merchant marine and fisheries committee, so we're going to be fighting for you. The real problem here is that there's a budget deficit and everyone's fighting for the same piece of the pie. Of course, they need more money. If we're concerned about safety. We have to give the Coast Guard the tools that they need to carry out their responsibilities,

Robert Lipsyte
well, you need more money, you've got to give them more money. Do you think that's going to be enough?

Michael Vickerman
Absolutely not. That just that just, I think is in some ways window dressing, the long range solution to this would be to begin a program of cutting back fossil fuel consumption, especially that which requires tanker traffic. Particularly in New York City. There is no reason why buses for example, can't run on alternative energies. There's no reason why we can't beef up insulation in cities buildings, so as to cut back on the amount of barrels that need to be pumped out of the ground

Robert Lipsyte
That's long range and one would hope that would happen in Valdez would wake people up to these kinds of needs. But on the short range, we're still thinking about something happening under the verrazzano bridge with two tankers colliding or some sort of disaster. I was a little concerned about your young officer saying we'd take a missile. So how does it feel you might even take less than that. But I mean, what would happen in terms of what would happen in this Harbor, the Staten Island Ferry wouldn't run all the produce wouldn't come in, it would really blight our lives?

Nita Lowey
Well, this is why I'm so concerned about licensing requirements. Because you can have coast guard in place, you can have adequate funds, so you're doing what you're supposed to do. And that human error, the person who's driving that tanker can cause a major problem with all the Coast Guard in place.

Robert Lipsyte
Yeah well, we'll come back to that because maybe blaming it on one drunken captain and maybe just blame it on Exxon might again, not be spreading out the blame, where it appears I'd like to stop for just a moment neither Exxon, nor the American Petroleum Institute would send a representative to answer questions here, but the institute issued this press release.

INTERVIEW CONTINUES:

Nita Lowey
Well, it's just part of the problem. Clearly, we have to get everything in place. The oil companies have to be doing their job, we have to get enough money. And every aspect of this problem has to be looked at

Robert Lipsyte
part of their doing their job, do you think is paying the bills for this? Because it looks as though we're going to be paying for some of this?

Nita Lowey
There's no question. In fact, Mr. Rawl of Exxon testified before my committee, and he's committed to us loud and clear that they're going to take responsibility for all the damages. The real question is, and we're a little concerned when all the Harvard and Yale and all the lawyers get involved is what is the extent of the damages. There have been fishermen who've lost their livelihood? How far do the damages extend? And this is something that I fear is going to go on for a long, long time. And I would hope they would continue to say loud and clear that they're going to take care of all the damages.

Robert Lipsyte
How far do you see these damages reaching Michael?

Michael Vickerman
Well, in terms of loss of wildlife, in terms of loss of livelihood, one, I think, instructive example would be what happened with the the Amoco Cadiz off of the coast of Brittany and 10 years after the spill took place in 1978. The shellfish and the other estuary and marine life still hasn't returned to their pre spill levels. It takes an awfully long time for an ecosystem to bounce back from something that permeates every step every stage of the food chain as does crude oil.

Robert Lipsyte
Captain North you know, the Coast Guard always kind of gets you know pointed at for not monitoring this or not monitoring that which doesn't always seem to be fair, you've got a lot of water to cover. I'm most concerned of here in New York Harbor, the guy who said in our tape PCA in an hour, we could respond to this spill. Well if you use the telephones lately, I mean he's gonna be making calls to get his crews together. They're not even full time worker

Robert North
All the facilities throughout the Arthur kill and kill van kull area, which is where they're predominantly located here, as that he mentioned, have cleanup equipment, containment cleanup gear at the site that they can deploy in less than an hour. What he was talking about was the clean harbors cooperative, which is a collection of larger quantities of equipment located in strategic areas throughout the Arthur kill. The oil companies provide much of the manpower to support that operation in addition to the commercial cleanup contractor that's employed by clean harbors.

Robert Lipsyte
Well, what would happen though, I mean, in terms of specifically that hypothetical, you know, your young lieutenant saying you know, just need a missile, but what would happen that that collision that thing that would never happen, the Titanic will never go down the Valdez.

Robert North
Instantaneous spill of a large quantity of oil is going to move. As they said, one can get out and deploy equipment try to contain it. In reality, once you have a large spill into an open water area, even if you were able to contain it, there are some conditions whether that will make make it very difficult to contain and clean up. Another strategy

Robert Lipsyte
You're talking about wind, rain,

Robert North
wind and current primarily

Robert Lipsyte
It has to be a really nice day in order for everything to run right.

Robert North
Correct Another strategy is to protect the sensitive areas and also to go downwind or down current of the oil and try to collect it as it moves. You can deploy skimmers in the open water area, if you can get boom to collect the oil and try to skim it. You can also trap the oil once it goes toward the shoreline and create calm areas where you can try to

INTERVIEW CONTINUES

Robert Lipsyte
Again, that's that's long term. And while you know we want, we don't want to just short term reaction, we do want to have the feeling that somebody is in charge here, big oil has shown that it's not in charge. The Coast Guard has been having some problems because there's cut back the government who is in charge who is going to take charge of this now?

Nita Lowey
Well I think every purson, every branch that you mentioned, has to do its part, the Coast Guard is going to look and see well, how did this happen? I hate to go back to the licensing. I don't like that issue. Maybe they're going to have to redo their licensing procedures. So it's not every five years. The oil companies have to say, Hey, who was driving that tanker? Look at our equipment. Maybe we're not as ready as we thought we were and government has to be sure that all this is enforced. So we're protecting the people in our environment, I think each part has to do its part

Robert North
I agree with the representative Lowey and that certainly with the legislation that's presently in effect, and the regulations promulgated under the various laws that were tasked to enforce, have a large number of people out in the harbor enforcing those laws, looking at vessels prior to arrival or upon arrival, looking at the facilities, and monitoring transfers between vessels and facilities. I think some of the statistics, she quoted about less than 200,000 gallons of oil, and one considers that there's some 18 billion gallons of oil move through the port in New York or in the Port of New York over a year. And some 170,000 gallons of it found its way into the water through a large number of small spills. We've done very well and enforcement in the sense of trying to minimize the routine operations that have caused a lot of oil in the water in the past

Robert Lipsyte
we're not even talking about liquid nitrogen gas and some of the other things are more exciting. We're almost out of time. One quick question. Should I cut up my Exxon card?

Nita Lowey
You're looking at me?

Robert Lipsyte
Yeah, what do you think that boycott is effective? Do you think that's a way to give a message to the

Nita Lowey
Oh, I haven't looked at all aspects of it. But my initial reaction is why Exxon it could have happened to mobil. It could have happened to anyone

Robert Lipsyte
It could have happened to anyone Michael do you feel that same way?

Michael Vickerman
It's not the company itself. It's our amp speaking about the entire nation. It's our addiction to black gold oil, if we can somehow curb our excessive consumption, which means not spending as much in mobile stations or arco or Chevron and to put into place after eight years of dismantling

Robert Lipsyte
I have to stop you there. Michael, thank you very much. Representative Lowey Captain north. Thank you very much for being with us. This is the 11th hour. I'm Robert Lipsyte.

Credits over show graphics.

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