WHIDBEY ISLAND, Washington — A famous local food – Penn Cove Mussels – may be in danger as a sunken vessel spills diesel fuel into the waters off Whidbey Island, and the man listed as the boat’s owner says it’s someone else’s problem.
The mussel harvest has been shut down while the Department of Ecology checks the water and shoreline for environmental damage.
The Coast Guard says it's contained most of the fuel leaking from the Deep Sea, an old crab boat that burned and sank Sunday. Divers pumped 275 gallons out of its tanks and caught another 300 gallons in floating booms.
Coast Guard Chief Darryl Harvey said he’s calling for more boom, and another crew and skimmer.
“I’m not treating this lightly by any means,” he said. “Just in case a thousand gallons burps up or escapes from this vessel.”
The State Department of Natural Resources says it’s been working for months to get the owner of the boat to move the vessel, which was anchored in Penn Cove last December. But officials said the owner, Roy Westmoreland, either has been hard to contact or less-than truthful.
“At one point, he told us he sold it and that failed, and (that statement) ended up falling through, wasn’t quite true,” said Melissa Ferris with DNR.
When KIRO 7 reached Westmoreland on the phone Monday afternoon, he denied ownership of the vessel.
“I actually sold the boat a couple of months ago,” Westmoreland said.
Told that he was the owner, according to the state, Westmoreland said, “no.”
KIRO 7 is working to discover who is the owner of the boat.