Act of sabotage creates large oil spill in Italian rivers

Police in Italy found that the large oil spill in the Lambro river, now heading for the river Po, was an act of sabotage. While the search for a suspect continues, authorities are trying to contain the damage.

The spill was detected Tuesday morning around 4 a.m. after someone broke into an abandoned deposit owned by ex-refinery Lombardi Petroli near Monza. According to France 24, the saboteur opened the faucets, yet according to the website Life in Italy, investigators found that someone had punctured the oil tank on purpose. A large amount of oil is now on its way to Italy's main river Po, because the Lambro is one of its tributaries. Despite the idyllic image that tourism sites still paint of the Lambro river, it has already been heavily contaminated since at least 1996, as a study by the Water Research Institute has shown. The French agency reports this

Hundreds of birds, have already died because of the spill.

Legambiente, Italy's largest environmental organization called the spill "an ecological disaster without precedent for the Lambro ecosystem."

Life in Italy, however, has much more to say about the disastrous impact the oil spill will have:

In an attempt to contain the damage, environmental protection authorities raised flood gates along the river and said they would attempt to pump as much of the oil out as possible.

While no stranger to pollution, the Po River - as well as its tributaries - are used by thousands of farmers to water their crops.

The wetlands of the Po Delta are also a wildlife preserve and home to over a 1,000 plant species and 300 different types of birds.

Business Week quotes an Italian paper when it cites the number of 600,000 liter, while France 24 speaks of at least 1,000 cubic metres (35,315 cubic feet), yet probably much more.