[Greens-Media] Mobil "not even trying" on emergency incident

[Elizabeth.Ingham at parliament.vic.gov.au]

Greens MLC Colleen Hartland has described Mobil's response to last night's 
incident at the Altona refinery as "not even trying".

"I started getting calls from community members soon after 9pm last night. 
 They could see the flaring for miles around, and they could see the cloud 
of gas or smoke.  But they couldn't find out what was going on."

"The Altona Refinery Hotline was a recorded message, without any 
information on the incident."

"The Hobsons Bay emergency after hours info line had a real person 
operator, but they had no information."

"Only one of the two Altona Refinery Community Liaison Committee contact 
numbers was answering his phone, and he hadn’t been told what was going 
on."

"The police emergency information line had a recorded message that 'this 
line is not currently active'. Meanwhile residents could see a police 
helicopter overhead."

"There really is no excuse for Mobil not to have told the Community 
Liaison Committee members and the Hobsons Bay after hours contact what was 
going on."

"Meanwhile, the next morning, we still don’t have any attempt at an 
explanation for the huge plume of smoke, steam or gas seen coming out of 
the site last night. Nobody at Mobil appears willing to admit that there 
was such a plume, let alone what was in it. But the plume is as clear as 
day in the photos*."

"If Mobil wants to have an oil refinery close a residential area and 
important wetlands, they have to realise that they have responsibilities, 
like fast community information when there's an incident.  If last night 
is anything to go by, they're not even trying," said Ms Hartland.

For comment: Colleen Hartland - 9689 6373
* Photos of incident available on request

***********************************


Liz Ingham
Office of Colleen Hartland MLC
Western Metropolitan Region

A: 75 Victoria Street, Seddon 3011
P: 9689 6373
M: 0409 333 595
F: 9689 6227
E: elizabeth.ingham at parliament.vic.gov.au
W: http://mps.vic.greens.org.au


///////************************************************************///////////////

Parliament of Victoria                                                                                                                    . 
Important Disclaimer Notice:


The information contained in this email  including any attachments, may be 
confidential and/or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, please 
notify the sender and delete it from  your system. Any unauthorised 
disclosure, copying or dissemination of all or part of this email, including 
any attachments, is not permitted. This email, including any attachments, should 
be dealt with in accordance with copyright and  privacy legislation. 
Except where otherwise stated, views expressed are those of the individual sender.