Changing ice conditions clear way for historic fuel delivery by barge to Alaska's North Slope

An Alaska company says changing ice conditions in the North Slope area have allowed it to make a bulk fuel delivery to Prudhoe Bay by barge for the first time.

KTUU-TV reported Thursday that Colville Inc. says that the single trip carried 8million litresof fuel.

The fuel took 70 hours to unload before it was moved to a tank farm in the community of Deadhorse.

A statement by Colville says that fuel for North Slope oil field operations is typically delivered over land by trucks pulling 16-metretankers from a refinery in Valdez to Deadhorse, a roughly 1,368-kilometre trip.

Colville says it makes 2,000 of those trips each year, each hauling nearly37,854 litres of diesel.

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