A two-vehicle accident on Main Street early Saturday morning, September 20, closed a section of the road to through traffic for about two hours as police, fire, and environmental crews investigated the collision and worked to clean up an estimated 100-gallon diesel fuel spill caused by the crash.

About ten hours later, emergency crews were reactivated after some West Street residents smelled  diesel fuel, which was then found floating on the surface of a stream that passes through their neighborhood.

Police said that motorist Brian Riguzzi, 39, of Wappingers Falls, N.Y., was driving a compact 2014 Hyundai Veloster auto northward near 86 Main Street, as trucker Thomas Fertig, 67, of Cornwall, N.Y., was driving a 2014 International tractor-trailer truck southward there at about 6:36 am.

The Hyundai then crossed over the road’s center line and struck the truck, puncturing an external fuel tank on the truck, causing about 100 gallons of diesel fuel to leak out from the damaged tank, officials said.

Riguzzi was transported to Danbury Hospital to be treated for cuts, police said. Fertig was not injured.

Both vehicles were towed away. The accident is under investigation.

Newtown Hook & Ladder volunteer firefighters responded to the accident, as did a spill inspector for the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP). Also, DEEP called in a private environmental crew to clean up the oily mess caused by the spill.

Hook & Ladder Fire Chief Ray Corbo said that the diesel fuel that spilled out of the truck’s external tank entered a stormwater catch basin on Main Street, near its southern intersection with Johnnie Cake Lane.

While the initial fuel spill cleanup work apparently was thought sufficient to immediately remedy the problem, it was not.

At about 4:17 pm, Hook & Ladder firefighters received a call alerting them of the odor of diesel fuel near 8 West Street, in the area where a brook drains southward toward Ram Pasture.

According to town Geographic Information System (GIS), the catch basin into which the diesel fuel had drained discharges its flow into an unnamed stream network lying west of Main Street. Those streams drain north-to-south and enter a large wetland lying west of Edmond Town Hall and Newtown Savings Bank.

Water from that wetland discharges into a stream, known as Country Club Brook, which runs southward, eventually entering Hawley Pond at Ram Pasture.

The area where the diesel fuel was found floating on the stream is just north of the point where Country Club Brook passes beneath West Street.

That location is approximately 2,200 feet south of the point where the diesel fuel entered the catch basin.

Chief Corbo said firefighters found that some diesel fuel floating atop the stream had drained as far south as the area lying west of The Inn at Newtown at 19 Main Street. That location is roughly 3,000 feet south of the catch basin near the spill site.

Firefighters placed multiple absorbent booms and pads along the course of the stream to trap any diesel fuel that was still in the watercourse, Chief Corbo said.

DEEP again responded to the area and again called in the private environmental cleanup firm for more work, Chief Corbo said.

To flush any residual diesel fuel out of the drainage system, firefighters poured 3,000 gallons of water into the catch basin that the fuel had entered earlier that day, he said.

Firefighters placed absorbent materials along the stream as far south as the point where it passes beneath Sugar Street, Chief Corbo said.

Spill Assessment

DEEP spokesperson Cyndy Chanaca said this week that the diesel spill was a “surface spill” which may have killed some grass, but only posed a minimal, temporary environmental problem.

The spill’s effects will not be long lasting because of the relatively small amount of fuel spilled and the ensuing quick cleanup work which recovered a much of the spilled fuel, she said.

As of September 22, DEEP staff observed that shellfish were active in the affected stream and juvenile fish were swimming about, with no apparent negative effects on stream activity, she said.

Booms positioned along the stream would remain in place until a heavy rainstorm, when any remaining fuel in the drainage system would be washed away, Ms Chanaca said on September 22.

Ms Chanaca said that approximately 100 gallons of diesel spilled in the incident and between 60 to 70 gallons of diesel were recovered through the cleanup work.