Satellite imagery from Planet taken on August 2 shows pollution covering at least 80 square kilometers in the Black Sea off the port of Taman in Russia's Krasnodar region, the environmental monitoring project Transparent World reported.
The slick stretches 20 kilometers south and southwest from the port. Brownish-red plumes with a filamentary structure are visible at the southwestern edge of the contaminated zone, likely indicating a spill or burning of vegetable oils, Transparent World noted.
Environmentalists link the spill to a Ukrainian strike on the port of Taman on the night of July 30. Vladimir Slivyak, co-chair of the environmental group Ekozashchita, said the pollution occurred after a large fire on August 1. According to ecologist Igor Shkradyuk, vegetable oil also entered the sea after a fire at a terminal operated by the company Efko; it washed up on a beach east of the port, and volunteers cleared four kilometers of shoreline.
Authorities have not commented on the oil product spill. Local and federal agencies have not reported the pollution itself, Agentstvo reported.
Slivyak described the Taman spill as one of the largest in the Black Sea this year. In April, after an attack on a shadow fleet tanker near Anapa, a slick of more than 200 square kilometers formed, and in Tuapse, after strikes on an oil refinery, pollution washed onto beaches — authorities collected more than 32,000 cubic meters of soil.