Coast guard conducts exercise to deal with oil spill

MUMBAI: To deal with the possible catastrophe of an oil spill off the country's coast, the Indian Coast Guard along with other authorities conducted a two-day-long National Level Oil Pollution Response exercise off the Mumbai coast.

Officials from private oil companies, ONGC, Indian Navy, Maharashtra State Disaster Management Authority, National Institute of Oceanography, JNPT and other agencies participated in the exercise.

"The aim of the exercise was to test the level of preparedness of the Coast Guard and other resource agencies in responding to a major oil spill," a spokesperson for the Coast Guard said.

The exercise is a part of the National Oil Spill Disaster Contingency Plan prepared by the Coast Guard in 1993 to deal with oil spills at sea, he said.

The Coast Guard has developed pollution response capability to respond to oil spills upto 10,000 tons with assistance from other agencies, he added.

The exercise included the testing of pollution control procedures of the Coast Guard and other drills to check preparedness to deal with oil spills.

The Coast Guard, the nodal agency to deal with oil spills, also has a specialized Pollution Control Vessel and is expected to have three such vessels in the near future.