Oak Marina Bay is a picturesque south eastern corner of Vancouver Island and where a 40ft sailboat sank on Monday, leaking up to 100 litres of oil into the water.
The owner of the boat has no insurance for the potentially $10,000+ price tag associated with a clean-up and a vessel of his has sunk before because of allegedly poor maintenance and neglect.
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A call reporting the drowned ship with only its mast above water was responded to by C-Tow Victoria and Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue.
The owner of C-Tow Victoria said if the sailboat had insurance, the spill would’ve been cleaned up by now.
The responders placed booms around the sailboat within half an hour of it sinking to contain the spill, though they found diesel was already pouring into the bay.
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Oak Bay Islands Ecological Reserve is right next door to the spill, though no reports have come of the oil spreading that far.
One of the sailboat’s materials, ferrocement, is used for the hull and makes it especially heavy and caused the boat to sink faster.
The boat’s owner is reportedly elderly and the previous boat of his that sank was never recovered.
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