Damages by vandals could prove costly

PORTALES — Thursday’s mineral oil spill in Portales could potentially cost the city $40,000 per block in road repairs.

The incident, called vandalism by officials, saw a massive amount of mineral oil leak from a J.D. Heiskell feed manufacturing facility into a 3 1/2 block radius in downtown Portales.

Police said they could not provide information on the criminal investigation related to the spill.

Crews from the city of Portales and the New Mexico Department of Transportation spent the day absorbing the oil with sand, but roads will face some damage regardless, according to Portales Public Works Director John DeSha.

“I expect to see (the damage) some time this summer. But again, it’s really hard to say,” he said adding the damage could materialize as anything from simple potholes to a complete deterioration of the roads into gravel.

Patching the potholes will cost the city $7,000 to $10,000 a block, according to DeSha, while rebuilding the road would cost three to four times that amount.

“We’d have to remove all the material that has that contamination in it, if it’s there. Normally what we do is grind the stuff up in place and use it as sub-base, but we’d have to take that out,” he said.

DeSha said the city has its own budgets for road repair, which contains enough money to handle most of the damage.

“What would probably happen, if it was a tremendous amount of repair, we would stabilize as best we could for now and budget (repair funds) for the next budget,” he said.

In the meantime, however, the city is simply monitoring the situation for damage.

DeSha added that his department is still putting down sand to absorb what’s left of the oil.

“What we’re doing is, we pick it up when it gets saturated, haul it off, and then put new sand down. I expect it to take a while. We’re just gonna be patient with it.”

Drivers are still advised to drive 15 mph on First and Second streets near Abilene Avenue.

J.D. Heiskell is also dealing with clean-up.

General Manager Dean McIntosh wouldn’t comment on exactly how much mineral oil spilled, but said the Portales facility is facing a situation similar to that of the city.

“They’ve put out sand and gravel to try to soak up the mineral oil that was spilled in the street, so that material is basically absorbing the oil that’s left out there,” he said.

“I think on our property, probably, we’re gonna need another day or two to go ahead and absorb as much of the oil as we can. We have dumpsters ready to go, plastic liners in them, ready to pick up the material here Monday.”

The tank that saw the spill wasn’t completely emptied, so the remaining mineral oil was mixed into feed on Thursday, according to McIntosh.

“We’ve been able to keep up with current feed orders,” he said.

Between the city departments that helped during the incident and with cleanup afterward, McIntosh foresees a cost for J.D. Heiskell.

“I’m expecting an invoice at some point for the city or county or the cleanup crews — the fire department, all that. We’ll see invoices from them, but I have not seen those yet,” he said.