
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 17, 1990                   TAG: 9004170518
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A/3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CORWIN SPRINGS, MONT.                                LENGTH: Medium

CHURCH'S UNDERGROUND FUEL TANKS HAVE LEAKED OVER 30,000 GALLONS

Underground tanks built by a religious group girding for apocalypse have leaked more than 30,000 gallons of fuel near Yellowstone National Park and are "popping their seams big time," an official warns.

The leaks had neighbors fed up and the state considering legal action against the Church Universal and Triumphant as work continued Monday to clean up the mess.

The group stored 634,500 gallons of gasoline and diesel fuel in 35 underground tanks as part of a 750-person fallout-shelter complex it is completing at its Corwin Springs headquarters five miles north of Yellowstone.

The fuel was intended for use after an unspecified global catastrophe - possibly nuclear holocaust - the group believes may occur this spring. The church and its followers are building dozens of smaller shelters in the Paradise Valley region north of Yellowstone preparing for possible disaster.

The fuel leaked from at least three of the 35 underground tanks. The church reported the leaks last week. State officials fear more ruptures.

The head of the state Water Quality Bureau, Steve Pilcher, warned Monday: "They're popping the seams big time; these aren't any small ruptures."

Reporters were not allowed by the church to visit the site, near Mol Heron Creek, an important trout spawning stream that runs into the Yellowstone River.

Small amounts of fuel that reached the creek Sunday were gone Monday, and no major damage had occurred, officials said. But U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials took water samples downstream from the spill for tests.

State officials met on Monday in Helena to discuss legal steps against the church but reached no decision.

"I think any further progress [of construction] should be stopped. We'd like to see penalties assessed for the damage that's occurred," said Julia Page, president of the Upper Yellowstone Defense Fund in Gardiner, Mont., at the park's northern gate.

Church officials said they're committed to cleaning up the spilled fuel and will excavate and inspect all 35 tanks. Workers were pumping out tanks and loading the fuel into trucks to be taken as far away as Salt Lake City.

"No one wants a repeat of this situation," said church spokesman Murray Steinman. "Everything that can be done is being done."

by CNB