(Photo by Thai PBS News)

From Bangkok Post

Oil washing up on Mae Ramphueng beach in Rayong could be the “nail in the coffin” for hotels and restaurants already brought low by the pandemic, local hospitality business operators said on Saturday.

The navy and pollution experts are scrambling to clean up the mess created by the spill that took place in the Gulf of Thailand on Tuesday after at least 60 tonnes of crude leaked from a pipeline about 20 kilometres off the coast.

Crews in yellow plastic protective suits fanned out along the beach on Saturday afternoon to start cleaning up the oil slick that began washing ashore late Friday night.

Star Petroleum Refining Plc (SPRC), the operator of the undersea pipeline that leaked, said it was trying to minimise the amount of oil reaching the shoreline by using booms.

An aerial surveillance aircraft is monitoring the slick on the sea. A 47-square-kilometre area was affected before the slick drifted to the shoreline late Friday, a satellite image from the government’s Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency showed.

https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2255531/oil-spill-the-last-straw-for-rayong-tourism

                                          

This is not the first oil spill in the area. A few years ago, oil leaked again from a pipeline and covered several beaches on Koh Samet close to Rayong. That took a long time to clear up.