Manolis L cleanup progressing well, thanks in part to co-operative weather

Good weather has helped the Manolis L cleanup move quickly and smoothly, and oil recovery is expected to finish by mid-September, says the coast guard.

"It's a very happy day, Ithink,today and over the last little bit,"Greg Lick, incident commander with the Canadian Coast Guard, told CBCRadio'sCentral Morning Show onFriday.

"We've been very successful over the last week or so in getting oil out of the ship and out of the environment."

• Plans outlined for oil removal from Manolis L shipwreck
• What it takes to remove oil from a shipwreck

At this point, Lick said, most of the oil has been safely removed from the tanks that, based on an assessment done last summer, contained heavy fuel.

Fuel began leaking from the ship during a storm in 2013.

There is only one more tank remaining, he said, and if the weather continues to hold that could be dealt with in the next few days. Then Ardent Global the American company awarded the contract to clean the wreck of the paper carrier, which sank off the coast of Change Islands in 1985 can move on to the tanks that have minimal amounts of oil in them.

"We need to work through that to make sure that we work through every tank in that ship," he said.

The final step will be sealing up the entry points for oil removal, as well as any other areas necessary, to ensure any remaining trace amounts of oil do not leak from the ship in the future.

Lick met with residents of Change Islands yesterday to update them on the long-awaited project's progress.

"We were very much welcomed there and Iwas able to share the good news with them," he said.

"They were extremely ecstatic and Ireally did thank them for all the work that they did to actually push this into the public eye and to ensure that the environment out there, which is absolutely beautiful, was protected for the future."

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