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Underground tunnel found in CUC’s Rota power plant
An underground Japanese tunnel was accidentally discovered on Rota by a contractor of the Commonwealth Utilities Corp.
According to CUC acting executive director Gary Camacho, the tunnel was found earlier last month by their contractor who is “helping with a certain area of the power plant.”
“The contractor was working on a certain area near the power plant and the certain area caved in and they found out it was a tunnel,” Camacho said.
During CUC’s board meeting last Monday, Camacho mentioned that their transformer and oil storage facility is directly above the tunnel.
Camacho said the tunnel is an elaborate one that goes in different directions noting that it looked something from the war era.
“It’s all cemented, floors also, this is not dirt [tunnel],” Camacho said.
He added that a representative from the Bureau of Environmental and Coastal Quality on Rota was already able to do initial inspections of the tunnel, noting that nobody knew about the tunnel before the recent discovery.
Water and oil were found inside the tunnel although it is not yet clear where they came from and how they have been there.
Director Albert Taitano raised the question on who will be responsible for its clean up.
“Who is responsible for cleaning the oil sludge that’s inside the Japanese tunnel? Is it us? Is it EPA (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency)?” Taitano said.
It is not yet clear who will be made responsible, and Camacho said they will be waiting for the evaluation.
“CUC’s not taking any ownership at this time until such time that determinations have been made where and how long that oil has been there because that could be many, many years,” Camacho said. “We’ll wait for that evaluation.”
Director Joe Torres, meanwhile, said that they can do their own assessment so that they can have their own records.
“We can take the lead to do the assessment just to make sure that when it pops up, we don’t get the ending part of the fine,” Torres said, “I recommend that we do the assessment for record purposes, so that when EPA comes in, we have a record.”
