An industrial accident has flooded the waters and the environment surrounding the Ambárnaya River with more than 20,000 tons of diesel . The oil spill began on May 29 after an accident at a plant owned by a division of Nornickel, the world's largest nickel producer, near the Siberian city of Norilsk. According to the Russian authorities, the pollutants quickly reached the Ambarnaya River about 12 kilometers from the plant, while 800 tons of diesel were found in the adjacent territory.
Clean-up operations have already started but the surrounding waters and soil of Norilsk are expected to remain contaminated for several decades.
"Maximum permissible levels of pollutants have been found to have been exceeded in water areas by tens of thousands of times, " said Svetlana Radionova, head of environmental watchdog Rosprirodnadzor.
Conservationists are genuinely concerned that the incident could have a catastrophic effect on local wildlife, and WWF-Russia has warned that the spill could affect the health of the wild fish, birds and mammals living in the area.
"Diesel fuel is more toxic than oil, and right now the circumstances seem so massive," Alexey Knizhnikov, Head of the Corporate Environmental Responsibility Program at WWF-Russia, said in a statement.
