Oil Detected in Louisville Water Intakes

By Associated Press

January 28, 2005, 11:21 PM EST

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- The city's water company began detecting oil at its water intakes along the Ohio River on Friday, days after a ruptured pipeline sent 63,000 gallons of crude into a tributary upriver in northern Kentucky.

The city's drinking water is drawn from the Ohio River, and Louisville water officials said they suspected that the spill was responsible. Louisville Water Co. treated the water to remove tastes or odors associated with the oil.

The pipeline operator said the spill was contained in the Kentucky River by a series of booms that collected the oil slick, which at one point stretched up to 12 miles long. But a federal Environmental Protection Agency official had said it was "unreasonable" to expect cleanup crews to recover all the oil from the site of the rupture about 60 miles from Louisville.