All news

280 hectares of beaches require recovery after fuel oil spill — minister

About 840,000 cubic meters of new sand need to be imported

MOSCOW, January 23. /TASS/. 280 hectares of beaches provisionally require to be recovered and about 840,000 cubic meters of new sand should be imported there, Russian Minister of Natural Resources Alexander Kozlov said at the meeting held by President Vladimir Putin.

"To date, taking into account already cleaned-up territory, we estimated the area requiring recovery. This is 280 hectares provisionally," the minister said. "The volume of new clean sand we need is about 840,000 cubic meters; the covering depth will be extra 20 centimeters. That is, this is about four times more than have been exported recently," he noted.

The greater volume of new sand required is because the government will endeavor to make beaches even better than before the fuel oil spill, Kozlov added.

On December 15, 2024, the Volgoneft-212 and Volgoneft-239 tankers were caught in a storm in the Kerch Strait area in the Black Sea. The Volgoneft-212 subsequently sank while the other ship ran aground. One sailor died, and the rest were evacuated. According to emergency services, the tankers were carrying about 9,200 tons of fuel oil. An oil spill occurred in the Black Sea as a result of the accident, and clean-up operations are underway. According to the Russian Ministry of Transport, about 2,400 tons of oil has leaked into the Black Sea, much less than initially estimated.