On May 12, 8:51*am, "Cwatters"
wrote:

Neighbour of mine had an oil leak recently and lost the contents of their
heating oil tank into the ground. The clean up operation has taken a two
weeks so far and is costing them a small fortune not to mention the fine.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Yes that can happen. Especially in an urban area. In more rural areas
it is amazing how far leaked oil can travel, polluting drinking wells
along the way! In one case here the large hole (many dump truck
loads) that had to be excavated to remove oil polluted soil was used
to build a basement onto which a rentable extension to the house was
built.
One failure mode (of outside tanks) has been when unprotected oil
lines have snapped off due to ice and snow, thus leaking the oil onto
the ground. Where tanks have leaked (usually due to internal rusting)
inside a house it has soaked into concrete basements floors. The smell
(and possibly health hazard?) never goes away.
Regulations for installation of oil tanks has been improved and that
along with greater use of electricity, due here to lower cost, is
reducing the hazard. Oil leakage insurance can be expensive even when
the oil tank replacement has been done in an approved/certified
manner.
There have been a few hospitalizations (in a population of 500,000
persons) due to ingesting oil. And problem is that once a well has
been polluted it may be years, if ever before, it is fit for use
again..