Companies tell of effort to stop fuel leak

Three companies accused of playing a role in spilling 10,000 litres of fuel from a Glen Innes petrol station say they were not at fault and did everything reasonable to stop the petrol escaping.

Petrol station franchiser petrol Alley Services (GAS) and contractors URS New Zealand and Brown Bros (NZ) were charged after a fuel spill at a GAS petrol station at Line Rd, Glen Innes. During several weeks of argument in the Auckland District Court, prosecutor Auckland Regional Council said errors by the companies contributed to fuel gushing into the ground and nearby stream one day in December 2007. It said much of the fuel might still be there and called for more ground tests.

The council alleges Brown Bros accidentally drilled a hole about the size of an old 50c piece in a fuel line meant for carrying 91 octane, which was not picked up by the other parties. A fourth company, Fuelquip (NZ) - which GAS hired to help get the service station up and running after it was closed for a period - has already pleaded guilty to the unauthorised discharge of a contaminant.

URS brought in Brown Bros to help with some drilling after it was asked to test the site for contamination by former owner Caltex. The spill happened when the petrol station was reopened under the GAS brand a few months later. URS and GAS each argued they could not have been expected to predict alleged mistakes by the other.

In written arguments to the court, Brown Bros said it could not have made the hole because it hand-drilled down to 1.2m and would have seen the fuel line if it had been hit. The company did not know there were fuel lines on the site that could be damaged, it said.

URS, in turn, said in written arguments that if Brown Bros did damage the line (which it denied) it was not URS' fault because it had taken all reasonable steps to stop that happening. URS could not have foreseen that GAS would reopen the petrol station without checking the fuel lines.

GAS denied it should have asked Fuelquip to test the fuel lines before petrol was pumped back into them. It said it knew Fuelquip had not tested the lines but relied on Fuelquip to tell it what was needed to get the site up and running. URS reports to Caltex after testing the site for contamination did not mention a fuel line being drilled through, said GAS' lawyer Craig Langstone.

Mr Langstone said the chance of a company such as URS or Brown Bros drilling a hole in a fuel line and then not repairing it was "extraordinary", and GAS could not have foreseen it.

By the time GAS learned of the leak all 10,000 litres of fuel had escaped. It urgently hired contractors to clean up the fuel at a cost of about $240,000, he said.

Mr Langstone said his client had evidence that more than 200,000 litres of fuel and water were sucked out of the stream after the spill, making it unlikely there was fuel still sitting in the ground.

He said experts had thoroughly tested the site and found no need for a further clean-up.