A Boat Sank at the Dock. The Fuel Went Into the Lake.
A boat does not have to sink in a storm or in deep water to become a problem. Sometimes it goes down tied to a dock, and the fuel goes with it.
On Sunday evening, October 11, crews in Colchester, Vermont, were called to West Lakeshore Drive for reports of a fuel leak, WCAX reported. When the fire chief arrived, the chief found a boat sitting on the bottom at a marina, leaking fuel into Lake Champlain.
A Quick, Coordinated Response
Colchester Fire brought in special equipment and called the Vermont State Hazardous Materials Response Team to contain the leak and limit its spread to surrounding waterways. Crews raised the boat the next day. Responders said cooperation on scene helped reduce the environmental impact.
The cause was ordinary. The owner had brought the boat to the marina to sell it. The marina said it likely sank because of a faulty bellows, which let it take on water.
That is the part worth sitting with. No crash, no storm, no dramatic rescue. One worn part, one boat on the bottom, and a fuel leak that needed a fire department and a state hazmat team to get under control.
When Nobody Is There to Call It In
The Colchester boat was found within hours, in a marina, next to a road, by people who knew exactly what they were looking at. It came up the next day.
Most of what sinks in Utah's lakes and reservoirs gets none of that. Our Utah Waterways Submerged Debris Atlas documents an estimated 499 submerged items across 20 Utah lakes, including 56 vehicles and 103 vessels that are individually confirmed. Many have been down for years.
Every one of those vehicles and vessels went in with something aboard. A sunken vehicle carries a fuel tank, engine oil, ethylene glycol and a lead acid battery. Under the Clean Water Act, a discharge that leaves a visible sheen on the water is reportable. And petroleum does not simply go away once it is out of sight: the U.S. Geological Survey has tracked petroleum contamination persisting in groundwater for decades at its research site near Bemidji, Minnesota.
What Fathom Does Today
Fathom Restoration is a disabled-veteran-led Utah 501(c)(3) nonprofit, and our volunteer divers work under the surface of Utah's lakes and reservoirs to bring up the debris nobody else can see. On October 10, four of our divers worked Haws Point at Strawberry Reservoir and came up with about 35 pounds of trash by our estimate, including three folding chairs, an umbrella and a kite. On two September crew dives at Deer Creek Reservoir, we brought up about 58 pounds more.
That work is done by hand, one dive at a time. The vehicles and vessels in the Atlas will take more. We are building toward their recovery, and we are doing it in order: insurance, permits and commercial dive certification first. When that work begins, it will depend on the same thing the Colchester crews showed, the right people and the right equipment working together.
Small Failures Add Up
A faulty bellows is a small thing. So is a cracked hose or a forgotten drain plug. Lakes collect the results of small things for decades. The Colchester boat came up in a day. Utah's water is still holding the ones that never did.
Fathom Restoration is a disabled-veteran-led Utah 501(c)(3) nonprofit running volunteer dive cleanups on Utah's lakes and waterways and building toward the recovery of submerged vehicles and vessels. Donate or volunteer at fathomrestoration.org.
