WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 (UPI) -- The owners of a vessel that caused an oil spill in the San Francisco Bay in 2007 agreed to pay $44.4 million in damages and penalties, the government announced.
The M/V Cosco Busan ran into the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge in November 2007, spilling about 1,250 barrels of oil into the San Francisco Bay.
Federal, state and local officials signed a decree that requires vessel owners and operators Regal Stone Ltd. and Fleet Management Ltd. to pay $44.4 million for damages and penalties associated with the spill.
"With this settlement, we are seeing to it that those responsible for the spill are held accountable and that they pay their share for restoring and improving our precious natural resources and public lands," U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said in a statement.
Federal and state authorities estimate that more than 6,500 birds were killed and more than 3,300 acres of shoreline were contaminated by the spill. As much as 29 percent of the herring spawn that winter was affected by the spill, authorities said.
More than $18 million of the settlement goes to compensate for the lost human uses of the region, the largest recovery for such an incident in U.S. history. State park authorities will get about $9.8 million of that to improve coastal areas.
