* Oil goo lurks on some beaches, even after cleanup

* State attorney general demands more help from Washington

* People wary of swimming, even after ban is lifted

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla., June 25 (Reuters) - Bans on swimming were partially lifted in the Florida Panhandle on Friday, but a state official called for a beefed-up federal response after the area took its worst hit yet from the BP BP.LBP.N oil spill.

State emergency officials signaled that the tourist haven was far from in the clear as they continued to report sightings of gooey debris and even some liquid crude coming in from BP’s Deepwater Horizon well site more than 100 miles (160 km) away.

In a letter on Friday to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum asked for more oil skimmers and other equipment to support the state’s cleanup efforts, saying the federal response to the disaster had been painfully slow so far.

“With oil mats, sheen and tar balls now coming ashore on Florida beaches, the continued slow response and limited resources being directed to protect our coasts from the effects of the Deepwater Horizon blowout is extremely frustrating,” McCollum wrote.

Until late Tuesday, the Panhandle had been spared from the early impact of the spill already marring the Gulf Coast states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

But health officials were forced to issue “red flag” warnings against swimming across much of the region on Wednesday, after thick oily sludge washed ashore on Pensacola Beach and other once-pristine stretches of nearby coastline.

Only a few people could be seen braving a dip off Pensacola Beach on Friday, after the swimming ban was lifted there and at other nearby beaches. The sand was still littered with sludge and tar balls, even after it was worked over by BP cleanup crews backed by tractors with cleaning equipment and heavy duty frontloaders.

Nikki Goode, on her honeymoon from Huntsville, Alabama, said she didn’t believe the extent of the damage to the beach until she saw it with her own eyes.

“We are a little sad. It is heartbreaking to be here and experience it as tourist but especially experience it for the community,” she said.

Steve McKnight from Pace, Florida, has been coming to Pensacola Beach for 35 years. He brought his kids to see the tar-stained white sand on Friday.

Even though swimming was allowed again, McKnight said he would not let his kids anywhere near the water.

“There is no way. We will go up the river and swim if we want to go swimming. But there is no way I would let them get in the water (here) now,” he said.

“I just don’t like the way that it looks right now,” added McKnight’s 6-year-old son, Conner.

MASSIVE TAR MATS

State officials had hoped for a respite as the winds and currents shifted and began to move the mass of oil to the west and northwest, away from the Florida Panhandle.

But a website set up by state emergency response officials was filled to overflowing on Friday with fresh reports of sludge, including tar mats as big as 10 feet (3 meters) wide fouling beaches and azure Gulf waters.

An oil slick moving southwest to northeast in one area off the Panhandle was 30 feet (9 meters) wide and three miles (5 km) long and full of golf ball-size tar balls, according to one reconnaissance report posted on the web site map.floridadisaster.org/gator/.

“It’s a shame,” said Alice Watkins, a Houston resident who had planned to stop in Pensacola on her way to Tampa to see her daughter and new granddaughter.

“I was going to stay for a few days before heading on but I’m going to leave today instead. All these machines. it’s too depressing,” Watkins said. (Additional reporting by Ben Gruber in Pensacola Beach, Editing by Tom Brown and Doina Chiacu)