Mon | Day 13 – Kill the Spill in the Media

Here are a few articles covering the surf community’s grassroots efforts:

1.  LA Times 11.18.07  “Spill Guerillas Hit the Beach”

2.  Surfline 11.13.07:  “KILL THE SPILL San Francisco surfers take cleaning Ocean Beach into their own hand”
– article by Marcus Sanders, with quotes from Proof Lab and Surfrider SF:

3.  Surfer Magazine: “SEEPING THROUGH SAN FRAN: Oil Spill Ravages OB, Mavericks Next?
– with quotes from Grant Washburn

4.  Santa Cruz Sentinel 11.18.07  – “San Francisco surf spots on lockdown after oil spill; Santa Cruz beaches safe for now.”
– with quotes from Wise Surfboards’ Dave Alexander

Mon | Day 13 – Fistful of OB Oil from Sunday

From OB resident, Ben Garcia: “As per sunday at 10 am there was plenty of small oil blobs seen on ocean beach.  I walked a small area between fulton and kirkham and in an hour or less had a fistful of oil.”  See photo above.

Mon | Day 13 – new update for Ocean Beach

More on OB, per Darin & Kathleen of Kill the Spill:

” I just checked OB [this morning, Monday] and there are signs saying the you should use the beach at your own risk.  Between Noriega and Taraval there were THREE quarter sized oil spots!  The surf looks good, overhead and glassy on the outside.” — Kathleen, Kill The Spill (KTS)

” Sunday:  [I hiked]around OB checking different spots. Even though many of the beaches in the area have been opened, I’m not so sure that I would play fetch with my dog in the surf yet or enjoy some of the nice swell that is in town.

Areas Checked at OB Area:
-Kelly’s
-Fulton
-Judah
-Noriega
-Taraval
-Sloat (first lot & second lot)
-Ft. Funston

Conditions:
Still some small oil spots here and there (very few) about a quarter or dime sized along the water line. Check any plastic or trash you see, as the oil bonds to floating objects. Surfers are reporting they don’t notice the water being oily.

[Again, it’d] be helpful is to check different parts of the coast line and [have everybody] post your results to the blog or email your info in. We have plenty of certified resources to sweep through an area now.”  – Darin Rosas, KTS

See also OB resident’s Sunday report in the comment section of the earlier Monday update.

Mon | Day 13 Update – Pacifica, Berkeley, Ocean Beach, Marin

Thank you all for your reports.  Keep them coming in, so we can let the official agencies know where to deploy more resources. 

PACIFICA:
Per Greg Cochran of Pedro Point Surf Club on Sunday:

 “We have had small amounts of oil washing ashore on all of our beaches.  The Pro Cleanup crew cleaned Linda Mar this AM [Sunday]. Very minimal amounts on all beaches. We will continue to clean as need be. Beaches will remain open, as long as we don’t get massive amounts.  All indicators point to continued small amounts coming in with the High Tides. “

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BERKELEY – Volunteers needed
Matter of Trust is sending out more hair mats to Berkeley to get oil off the rocks.  We also had word on Sunday that Berkeley needs more certified volunteers to help with the cleanup of various sites, to supplement the contractor crews’ efforts. 

If you have your card, please call Deborah,  City of Berkeley Dept. of Parks, Recreation & Waterfront  510-703-2825, to be deployed.

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OCEAN BEACH: From OB resident, Ben Garcia: “As per sunday at 10 am there was plenty of small oil blobs seen on ocean beach. i walked a small area between fulton and kirkham and in an hour or less had a fistful of oil.”“There were no clean up crews, just ahandful of both gloved and ungloved volunteers that were hoping to find an organized effort. It seems there is still plenty of oil — the blobs are just a lot smaller and harder to spot.”

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MARIN:

Per D.Harrison on Sunday: 

“I went by Cronkite today at about noon… Spoke with the Park Ranger and Park Police, word in that hood is that the O’Brien crew had been cleaning that AM (with no “need” for volunteers) and were supposed to be back and were 2 hours late… The park ranger called into dispatch for us and tried to get us cleaning access, but no luck; 1st no guide to “supervise”, 2nd no waste designation area… He than said that a small volunteer crew was at Baker cleaning, but I later found out that was mainly an O’brien/Ind. crew…

….Three Surfers in the water at Cron Sunday AM and a hiker on the coast saw a BIG Great White attacking a seal.  [The shark was] finishing the job right in the breakers… so now Cron is closed to swimmers/surfers due to the shark…But again it looks as if that Marin is still seeing fresh deposits on the beaches, Cronkite is 1/2 way open and all water access is closed due to the shark.   At least mother nature is helping us out, the waves by the way at OB today and at cron were BIG…
But there is still a lot of oil landing, half of Cron was open but both Ranger and Police agreed it was too early to open up access and there should be a lot of volunteers combing the water line and high water line… But there are not…

The word from both employees about Marin is “A big lack of thorough cohesive communication; both on a local and state level with the O’Brien/Indep. cleaners.  Multiple agencies having big issues communicating…”

I will go by a couple of beaches in the AM (Muir/Tennessee Valley) but I hope to have word about Bolinas and Stinson tomorrow as well as the others, again if anybody has heard conflicting news, please let us know.  I have heard that oil has even been found in RCA!”