Approximately 4,200 gallons of crude oil spilled from a Plains All American pump station near St. Louis on Friday. Via FuelFix, some of the oil leaked into a nearby creek, but the local water supply was not affected. Plains said the flow of oil was stopped and containment booms were deployed in nearby waterways. The company attributed the leak to a pipeline fitting inside the station, which is located near the border of Bond and Madison counties in Illinois.
The incident comes less than two months after a ruptured Plains pipeline spilled 101,000 gallons of oil in Santa Barbara County, Calif. Approximately 21,000 gallons of oil leaked into the Pacific Ocean, fouling a popular state beach and spreading tar balls as far as Los Angeles County. The spill drew scrutiny from lawmakers over pipeline safety and prompted federal regulators to revise pipeline incident reporting rules.
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