Coast Guard: Tugboat leaking fuel after colliding with old Bonner Bridge

The Coast Guard says it’s investigating the collision of a tugboat with an old bridge on the Outer Banks.

The Coast Guard said in a news release Sunday that that tugboat Miss Bonnie collided with the old Bonner Bridge. The replacement for the aging bridge opened earlier this year.

The Coast Guard said no one was injured. All eight people aboard the tugboat made it safely ashore.

The collision left the tugboat semi-submerged and leaning up against the bridge, and the Coast Guard said diesel fuel was reported to be leaking from the vessel. About 3,000 gallons of fuel were on the boat, authorities said.

The responsible party has deployed 200 feet of absorbent boom and 175 feet of containment boom around the vessel and is expected to deploy secondary ocean boom and conduct salvage operations on Tuesday, as weather permits.

No impact to wildlife has been reported, and the channel remains open to all vessel traffic, authorities said.

The Coast Guard is working with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Scientific Support Coordinator to identify the most likely trajectory of the discharged diesel to determine necessary mitigation strategies for the preventative impact to environmentally sensitive areas.

"Protecting the marine environment is a top priority for the Coast Guard,” Capt. Bion Stewart, commander of Coast Guard Sector North Carolina, said in a statement. "We are overseeing the responsible party’s actions to mitigate environmental impacts resulting from the discharge and to remove the vessel when it is safe to do so."