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DICKSON, Alta. — People downstream of an oil pipeline breach in west central Alberta are worried but hopeful the spill won’t seriously damage the Red Deer River they depend on for water and recreation.

Andrew Van Oosten and his friends were hoping to go fishing Saturday but were told by Alberta Environment officials to stay away from the water.

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“I was going to go fishing but they said, ’No, you’re not allowed,”’ he said as huddled with his friends underneath a tarp at his campsite near the Gleniffer reservoir.

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“You are not allowed to go near the water because it [oil] is washing up on shore. I hope it just passes by in a week or two.”

Out on the lake that provides the water supply for the City of Red Deer and other communities downstream from Thursday’s spill, crews were busy spreading booms across the surface to skim away any sour crude.

Plains Midstream Canada estimates as much as 475,000 litres of oil spilled and then leaked into the river. The company says the oil spilled into Jackson Creek near the community of Sundre, about 100 kilometres from Red Deer.