Which was more idiotic, Mocco saying that the barge sank "because of cold weather" or blaming it on "someone else" when HIS FUEL BARGE was half-submerged?

Bend over, Pete-

Amazingly the owner of the Fuel Service is blaming the boaters of Morris Canal for the spill: ....."He told NBC 4 New York off camera that he thinks the culprit could be somebody dumping old diesel in the marina, too cheap to pay to dispose of it properly.".....

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/ ... oast-Guard-368900281.html

That's Liberty Harbor Marina, owned by Peter Mocco, the developer of the Liberty Harbor North complex. I kept my sailboat there from 1987 until 2000. Maintenance was a joke and the whole thing was poorly constructed to begin with. For example, the docks and finger piers were all NAILED together and the boat cleats were attached with nothing more than short lag screws into the 2x6 planking. The pilings (not tall enough for extreme tides) were starting to rot within 10 years and most of the docks floated up and over the pilings during Sandy.

I hope Mocco gets whacked with fines on this but he has a history of "Strategic Bankruptcies" in order to avoid his financial onligations. Guess we'll see how this plays out-

Awful. As mentioned, that particular canal isn't exactly the cleanest thing in the world to begin with - I'm more annoyed with what's down-current of that area. Assuming this was negligence, as it often is in cases like this, I hope the owner is facing some stiff fines that will pay for the cleanup of this spill.

Evidently, around 7:30a Sunday, a boat owner on the LSP side saw the barge sinking and called USCG. They by the USCG were told the barge has several thousand gallons each of diesel and gas. It was partially submerged in a photo I saw (listing ~30 degrees to starboard, with the water up to the bottom of the starboard tank).

During Sunday night, the barge was refloated and dumped a fair bit of diesel into the water (the pink in the photos below - fuel w/o road tax is dyed to make it easy to find people using it on road).

Needless to say, very bad for the local environment. Not that I'd recommend eating the crabs out of the canal anyway....

Morris Canal Boaters facebook group for more information:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/morriscanal/

Got a couple photos sent a few min ago - no idea when they were taken. It looks like the barge is still afloat, but perhaps sinking. It should also be noted the fuel tanks are on shore, just the pumps are on the barge.

The fuel dock has been closed for a couple years, I believe. That marina is very poorly run. The staff no little to nothing about boats and there are many maintenance issues.

http://imgur.com/a/dyze5

This post is confusing, you mention to hide the illegal dumping, you mean the illegal dumping of fuel? Why would somebody dump fuel? Also, what is the Facebook page you're referring to?

An alarming post on facebook, complete with a photo of the barge sinking or sunk, alerted me to this story I have not seen covered in the news. The fuel barge is the one on the North side of the Canal, familiar to all as the fueling station adjacent to the ferry gangway at the foot of Marin Blvd.
A member of a facebook page for local boaters claims he alerted the Coast Guard of the sinking barge Sunday February 14th about the spill, but from then on the story gets murky. This morning more photos of the barge and more alarming still, photos of a LOT of pink colored fuel, huge blooming clouds of it, show the fuel has escaped any kind of containment and is now polluting the canal with a LOT of fuel. Its hard to say how much, but there were many photos posted showing the spill.
The worst part of the story is that there is a person claiming the fuel was deliberately pumped into the water after nightfall to hide the illegal dumping. Anyone in the area know if any of this is true, or have better facts about the fuel spill?