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New oil spill afflicts Louisiana bayou

JEFFERSON PARISH, La., July 27 (UPI) -- A tugboat struck a wellhead in a Louisiana bayou early Tuesday, sending oil and natural gas into wetlands south of New Orleans.

Jefferson Parish Councilman Chris Roberts told New Orleans radio station WWL vessels had been dispatched to Bayou St. Denis to begin the cleanup. He said signs of oil had been found in marshlands near the wellhead.

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The U.S. Coast Guard said no one on the tugboat Pere Ana C. had been hurt in the collision near Muddy Lake.

Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser told the New York Daily News oil sprayed 20 feet up hours after the collision.

The oil spill comes three months after the disastrous explosion and fire on the BP Deepwater Horizon drilling platform off the Louisiana coast. That offshore spill, the worst in U.S. history, sent millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, where it has washed up in Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida.

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