As of: March 15, 2024, 7:09 p.m
By: Manuela Schauer
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An excavator removed contaminated soil material from the affected area.
The trailer for the heating oil truck is still in the background.
© dominik bartl
A little carelessness - and it happened: A large amount of heating oil leaked at the Oberammergau festival site.
The person responsible is being investigated.
Oberammergau – Everyone immediately freaked out.
Emergency services from the fire brigade, representatives of the district administration and water management office as well as the community rushed to the Oberammergau folk festival site on Thursday afternoon.
An industrial accident occurred there that could have had worse consequences.
A lot of heating oil leaked from a tank.
Bernd Sedlmaier estimates 1000 to 1500 liters.
And that's near the Labergraben and the Ammer.
But the building authority manager gave the all-clear on Friday afternoon: “Nothing was going in that direction”.
The incident occurred due to carelessness.
The driver of a heating oil truck, a 45-year-old local, had pumped the fuel from the trailer he was carrying into his truck.
However, after it was fully loaded, he forgot to disconnect the cable connection and drove off.
According to the Oberammergau police, the pipe broke and the oil spilled onto the ground.
The Oberammergauer noticed the problem and pressed the emergency stop switch.
This ensured that the trailer did not empty completely.
Expert takes samples
22 members of the local fire department immediately got to work.
“We sucked off the oil and bound it with binding agent,” explains Commander Stefan Maier.
So far so good.
But the unpaved ground was still contaminated.
Ideally, the construction company was there quickly.
Your task: excavating the earth.
Prevent groundwater contamination from occurring.
The excavator immediately removed around ten centimeters of soil, and on Friday the device added a little more.
In total he removed around 30 to 40 cubic meters of material.
Unlike the Lauterbach near Oberau, where heating oil also got into at the beginning of February, but a walker only noticed this later, the action in Oberammergau took place quickly.
Sedlmaier therefore classifies the situation as “harmless”.
Also thanks to the nature of the soil in the affected area of around 200 square meters.
“The fairground is extremely compacted,” says the building authority manager.
This meant that the heating oil could not penetrate deeply.
Fortunately.
“It would have been worse with humus.”
The expert's results will provide final certainty that there are no longer any contaminations.
He took samples on Friday morning.
However, if this is the case, it will be readjusted again next week.
The police have not yet been able to estimate how much damage the accident caused.
But one thing is certain: the tanker truck driver is being investigated for negligent soil contamination.