With no fanfare and few people realizing, an infamous chapter in Bay Area environmental history has closed. Or rather, sailed away.
The Cape Mohican, an 873-foot-long military cargo ship that was involved in one of the biggest oil spills in San Francisco Bay in the past half century, was towed from its longtime berth at the Port of Oakland and under the Golden Gate Bridge on Friday.
By Wednesday, it had reached Mexico, attached to a tug boat with a steel cable as thick around as a beer bottle and chugging along at 7 mph en route to the Panama Canal, then Beaumont, Texas, by Aug. 1, and probably not long after, to a final date with the shipyard in Brownsville to be broken down and recycled.
The hulking 50-year-old vessel, a gray barge carrier that stretches as long as the Transamerica Building laid on its side, saw service in the Persian Gulf War.
But its claim to fame — or infamy — occurred on Oct. 28, 1996, when a worker at a dry dock in San Francisco near Pier 70, just south of the present-day Giants’ ballpark, mistakenly opened a valve on the ship thinking he was releasing water. Instead, 96,000 gallons of heavy black bunker oil poured out. About 40,000 gallons of oil flowed into San Francisco Bay.
Windy weather and an early season rainstorm spread it quickly. The spill blackened miles of shoreline on Alcatraz and Angel Islands, drifted as far north as the Richmond San Rafael Bridge and washed up on beaches from Point Reyes National Seashore to Half Moon Bay.
“It was a horrible feeling to witness the pollution,” said Mary Jane Schramm, a volunteer at the time with the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary. “You would step in an area on the…
Fire in a garage at 2 Mohican TrailHouse fire: On July 10, a Mohican Trail house caught fire. Firefighters arrived and observed smoke pushing out from second floor eaves, with the main body of the fire appearing to be located in the garage. Police notified the homeowner who said he was out of town with his family, and no one was in the house. Firefighters used a hose line to attack the fire with water. They forced open the front door and found no one inside. They searched the house for extension and found a second-floor room above the garage to be affected by the fire. A second hose line was stretched for use fighting the fire in this area. Volunteer firefighters were dispatched for help. Greenville and Hartsdale fire departments also assisted until the fire was out. The fire investigator noted that the house was under construction, and the garage seemed to be the place where work materials were being stored. The cause of the fire could not be specifically determined. A contractor arrived on scene to board up the house during the homeowner’s absence.
Marek Hamsik will be hoping to lead Slovakia to the last-16 at Euro 2020 tonight
Hamsik loves to bathe shirtless in the snow, as shown on multiple occasions
NAPLES, ITALY – SEPTEMBER 28: Marek Hamsik…