Fuel Oil Contaminates Sevastopol Beaches After December 2024 Spill

Fuel oil continues to be found on the far beaches of annexed Sevastopol, spilled after the disaster of Russian tankers in the Kerch Strait in December 2024.

According to Crimea.Realii, this was reported by the occupying head of the city Mikhail Razvozhayev. According to him, he visited the Silver Beach and made sure that there is still fuel oil on the distant and inaccessible shores and rocks, especially in places where water does not reach.

These emission residues are supposedly cleaned up by specialized agencies.

"But it is obvious that the help of volunteers will be useful," Razvozhayev said, adding that volunteers will be brought to these areas next week.

At the same time, according to the National Resistance Center, the occupiers are burying the soil contaminated with oil products directly on the annexed peninsula.

"The Russians are turning the temporarily occupied Crimea into an ecological dump - instead of disposing of the sand contaminated with fuel oil in Krasnodar, they simply scatter it across the peninsula," the activists say.

Photo: rosmedia

According to them, the oil products that leaked after the accident of Russian tankers in the Black Sea should have been cleaned up, but most of the contaminated soil is not even taken out of the TOT.

"Officially, the Kremlin claims 'utilization,' but in reality, toxic waste is simply lost in the occupied territories," the Center adds.

The accident in the Kerch Strait became known on December 15. The shipwreck occurred near Cape Panagia in the Temryuk district of Krasnodar Krai, in the southwest of the Taman Peninsula, 12 kilometers from the village of Taman. It is the eastern entrance to the Kerch Strait from the Black Sea. According to official data, both tankers could have been carrying about 8,000 tons of oil products.

Later, environmentalists discovered areas contaminated with fuel oil on the coast near the village of Mykolayivka in the Serhiyivka community of Odesa Oblast. On January 29, utilities in Odesa Oblast began work to clean up the coast from oil pollution. Earlier, employees of the Tuzly Estuaries National Park found fuel oil on the park's coast, which they collected and handed over to Vladyslav Balynskyi's private laboratory. After that, the Commission on Technogenic and Environmental Safety and Emergencies at the Odesa Regional State Administration held an extraordinary meeting.

Meanwhile, the director of the occupation's Delphi Scientific and Ecological Center for Dolphin Rescue , Tatiana Beley , reported that the number of dolphins killed as a result of the Volgoneft tanker accident and fuel oil spill in the Kerch Strait has reached 84.

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