First Air is investigating after a spill happened at the Yellowknife Airport involving 300 to 400 litres of fuel last week.
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The incident happened around 9:15 p.m. April 5, after the driver of a forklift hit the nozzle of a fuel container with the machine.
In an email, communications manager with First Air Dan Valin told Moose FM that the spill covered approximately 20 feet by 150 feet of asphalt near the airline’s hanger.
“The spill kits were activated and deployed immediately to contain the spill,” Valin said.
“The fire department was called in to assess the situation, the cleanup started at 9:45p.m. after the fire department was done their assessment.”
Valin said that the initial cleanup went through the night until around 2 a.m., and after a short break continued until 2 p.m. the following day – a 17 hour job in total.
The container was a transfer fuel container, used to hold around 900 litres of fuel offloaded from aircrafts after flights to be re-purposed.
“No fuel reached any vegetation or ground,” Valin said.
“It was all contained to the asphalt between our hangar and ramp.”
