natural oil spills?...info please?

Does any one know if oil wells ever actually break open on their own,may be through an earthquake or something and pollute the oceans?

Has this ever happened? and is there the possibility that if this did happen it would be worse than a man made oil spill?....ie,i mean if oil floats on water and an oil well opened naturally through an earthquake say 2 miles down in the atlantic...it would rise to the surface of the ocean would it be more enviromentally disastorous than a surface spill?

Regards.

check this
and that

you can find more, just google the subject

[edit on 14-12-2004 by jazzgul]

Back in in the mid 1800 the very first oil wells were in poland but they wernt realy wells as the stuff was just running right out if the ground.
Can rember the name of the city this oil was near but if need i have the book and could look it up.

sorry people,i broke the "deny ignorance " rule....should have googled,just had never heard of this phenomenon before...it was more of a personal theory...apologies and thanks for the link jazzgul.