An inland oil drilling unit overturned in a Louisiana canal on Friday, but no fuel was leaking from the rig, the US Coast Guard said, as oil from a massive spill in the Gulf of Mexico washed ashore.
The mobile inland drilling unit (MIDU), far smaller than the BP rig that sank last week, tipped over in a navigational canal and no injuries were reported, the Coast Guard said in a statement.
"The MIDU has a 20,000-gallon diesel fuel capacity, and while there is no current estimate on how much fuel was on board at the time of the incident, on-scene Coast Guard pollution investigators have determined that the rig is not leaking fuel at this time."
Coast Guard responders have already deployed 500 feet of containment boom around the rig and planned to deploy another 500 feet shortly.
The incident comes as the Coast Guard battled alongside federal and state workers to combat a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
The oil, gushing at a rate of 5,000 barrels a day, is washing up on Louisiana's fragile coastline, prompting fears of an environmental catastrophe.
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