No state or federal aid for handling bird-killing goo emergency

Wildlife department workers Kevin Aceituno (left) and Beckye Stanton investigate a dead bird near Mulford Point, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2015, in San Leandro, Calif. Wildlife department workers Kevin Aceituno (left) and Beckye Stanton investigate a dead bird near Mulford Point, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2015, in San Leandro, Calif. Photo: Santiago Mejia, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Santiago Mejia, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 49 Caption Close No state or federal aid for handling bird-killing goo emergency 1 / 49 Back to Gallery

The deaths of birds from a sticky goo on San Francisco Bay this past week signaled an environmental emergency, but the network of skilled government agencies trained to swiftly respond to bay disasters was nowhere to be found.

That’s because the multiagency response that would have immediately mobilized containment and cleanup to prevent further damage is usually triggered only if the substance on bay waters is petroleum-based and reported by a company or ship.

What happened instead was a tepid reaction that was nothing close to the coordinated effort that happens when, say, a tanker ship sideswipes the Bay Bridge and spews fuel oil. The result was that wildlife agencies were on their own to cope with the crisis as the number of injured and dying birds soared.

More than a week has passed since the first birds covered in the gray goo turned up on the bay shoreline, but the substance has yet to be identified. More than 150 birds have died and more than 300 have been undergoing cleaning and treatment by a nonprofit wildlife rescue group. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife is investigating, putting a collection of gunk samples through a battery of tests at the department’s Sacramento laboratory. Results of necropsies on the dead birds have not been released. Meanwhile, no state money has been made available for cleanup, rescue work, feeding or rehabilitation.

Spending $9,500 a day

“We are bearing the entire cost of the animal care from the time they get to the center to the time they are hopefully released,” said Barbara Callahan, interim director of the nonprofit International Bird Rescue center in Fairfield, which is spending an estimated $9,500 a day rescuing and rehabilitating the gummed-up waterfowl brought to the facility. “I would love to see some agency say, 'Yes, we’ll help you with the cost of this,’ but it seems to be outside of everybody's department.”

The problem is that the comprehensive nationwide law designed to minimize the impact of oil spills does not include other pollutants in the carefully laid out protocols that govern disaster response. Oil spills in California generally involve the establishment of a cleanup command structure involving the U.S. Coast Guard and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response.

The Coast Guard did a flyover of the bay after the first birds were discovered, but spotters did not locate a slick or plume in the water. A Coast Guard spokesman said the agency does not get involved in such incidents unless petroleum or a polluting vessel is identified.

Oil spills only

“When it is not a petroleum compound, and it is not readily identified, it becomes more difficult to activate the system because the system was developed for oil spill response,” said Mike Ziccardi, director of the state-financed Oiled Wildlife Care Network at UC Davis.

It’s a troubling situation because California’s system for handling oil spills is considered one of the nation’s most sophisticated, honed by practice and an embarrassing lesson on what not to do that regulators won’t soon forget.

Everyone agreed something had to be done after the container ship Cosco Busan sideswiped the Bay Bridge the morning of Nov. 7, 2007, spilling more than 50,000 gallons of fuel oil into the bay. The disaster caused an uproar after it was revealed that miscommunication and foot-dragging allowed nearly the entire day to pass without attempts to contain the spill. By nightfall, strong bay currents had dispersed the sludge and fouled beaches throughout the Bay Area. Some 26 miles of shoreline were coated with oil, and an estimated 6,849 birds and thousands more fish were killed. The spill cost about $70 million to clean up.

The incident prompted officials to plan for the next bay emergency. Training was expanded, communications among government agencies improved and emergency response handbooks were provided to local yacht owners and marinas. The state provided grants to local governments to acquire booms and other oil spill cleanup equipment.

The first test of the new system occurred in 2009 when the Panamanian tanker Dubai Star spilled bunker fuel south of the Bay Bridge. Patrol boats, oil skimmers, utility boats and helicopters were deployed and 11,000 feet of boom were laid. There was, nevertheless, a gap of about four hours between the time the spill was reported and the time booms were placed around the ship, enough time for the thick black oil to disperse and wash ashore, authorities said.

Exxon Valdez disaster

The response was improved in 2013 when another tanker crashed into the Bay Bridge. No oil was spilled, but the response was immediate and comprehensive.

California’s oil spill program is a product of the federal Oil Pollution Act of 1990, passed a year after the Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska's Prince William Sound. It required oil tankers and other ships to, among other things, hire cleanup managers in case of an accident. The law requires ship owners to outline oil spill prevention and response plans, have enough insurance to cover up to $1 billion in damage, and designate a management company and “oil spill response organization” to clean up in the event of an accident.

Ships that are carrying oil as cargo or fuel are required to immediately notify the various agencies, including local emergency management officials and the Coast Guard, whenever there is a problem. The response protocol in California includes mobilization of the Oiled Wildlife Care Network and International Bird Rescue, which occupies a 10,000-square-foot building owned by the state.

None of this applies, however, when something other than oil or fuel is spilled.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife said in a written statement that the agency “does have a dedicated program for oil spill response, but does not have an analogous program for other types of pollution.”

The fact that the mystery gunk circulating around the bay is not petroleum is only one of the problems. Nobody knows how the glutinous globules got into the bay, let alone who is responsible, so there are no deep pockets available to dig into.

The spiller pays

“In the U.S., it is a spiller-paid system. If a spiller is identified, there is the potential of getting cost recovery,” said Ziccardi, who has provided wildlife rescue center workers with equipment and volunteers, but cannot provide money. “The systems that we have in place ideally could be activated and fully implemented no matter what the cause, but the fact is that there are regulations that limit some of those abilities to respond. In this case, the rehabilitation organizations have to take the lead.”

The goo problem is not nearly as bad as the Cosco Busan disaster or the Dubai Star spill, but wildlife biologists wonder what would happen if it were. Who would handle a pollution catastrophe in which oil wasn’t involved? It is, they say, a legislative missing link.

“It’s a loophole in the law that needs to be fixed, even if we don't know who the entity is, because how fast you respond to these incidents is critical,” said Cindy Margulis, executive director of Golden Gate Audubon. “If you don't deploy enough resources to find all these birds and collect them, you have a wildlife emergency that is even worse.”

Rebecca Dmytryk, president and chief executive officer of Wildlife Emergency Services, a Bay Area organization dedicated to improving wildlife emergency response, said the protocols for handling pollution in the bay need to be expanded beyond petroleum-based products.

“We're all on our own and that's the sad part,” Dmytryk said. “It's really frustrating, and I'm sure it’s frustrating for the agencies too that wildlife and bay habitat are being damaged. I just know we have to get better because this is not the last time that something like this is going to happen.”

Callahan said she does not blame the state or its workers for failing to fund the goo response. State fish and wildlife officials have done everything they could under the circumstances, she said.

“They've followed up on every suggestion, taken samples of feathers and carcasses and I have seen several of our colleagues at the Oiled Wildlife Care Network volunteering their time and helping,” she said. “It would be great if something like this were covered, but I know that state funding comes from the oil industry. I get it, but it doesn't seem very fair right now.”

Peter Fimrite is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: pfimrite@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @pfimrite.

How to help

To report a sick or dead bird, or donate money to help offset costs to the International Bird Rescue, go to the organization’s website, http://www.bird-rescue.org/.

People can also report distressed birds on http://goo.gl/forms/cRxIyc1bTx or by calling Wildlife Emergency Services at (831) 429-2323. To volunteer, e-mail Rebecca Dmytryk at rebecca@wildlifeservices.org.

Note: Bird Rescue officials are asking the public not to go out to the beach or show up at the center. Only trained volunteers can collect and clean birds.