What did I do

On a cold day of .... Willis Elkins (North Brooklyn Boat Club and Newtown Creek Alliance) took me on a boat ride across Newtown Creek to look for some random oil sheens which are sometimes floating on Newtown Creek. We planned visit several places where we would have a higher chance to find them. First we decided to focus on the Dutch Kills area in Queens and than on other spots along the creek.

Shortly after we entered the Dutch Kills, we noticed several 2" - 5" thick strings of sheens which reminded us coal tar rather than oil. We collected them with our newly acquired Coast Guard Oil Collection Kit. (small net on the picture below). Than we proceeded deeper into the Dutch Kills looking for more sheens. We could not find any until we came by the 49th Ave Bridge (marked on the Google map above). Than we realized that we are floating in the middle of a huge oil sheen which spans most of that area of the creek. We did not noticed it first, because the whole water surface was a sheen so there was virtually no clean spot of water to compare and see the difference. We collected samples and returned home because we already had enough of material to test.

My attempt and results

We collected the first sheen (suspected coal tar) with Coast Guard Oil Collection Kit. (small net on the picture)

As the kit manual suggest we collected also a water spec from the same area to compare. (into a small bottle which came with the kit)

For the second - large sheen we used two PIG Mats and also larger glass bottle to collect water and the sheen.

Questions and next steps

We will attempt to analyze the collected sheens during our workshop at the Sunview Luncheonette using (also testing) the new LED Cuvette frame for our OTK, Freezing Method, and pressure methods for the PIG mats.

More pics from the trip