a pollution spill about 60 kilometers long entered into east China's Shandong Province Saturday afternoon with the density of the spill higher than expected, according to a source with the provincial environment supervision center Sunday.

A diesel oil spilt occurred on Thursday in the city of Gongyi, central China's Henan Province when six tons of diesel oil leaked into Yiluo River, a tributary of China's second longest Yellow River.

Henan Provincial authorities performed timely operations to stop the pollutions from spreading, and in view of the leakage amount, experts said there would not be much spills in the water at the time when it entered into Shandong Province, said Zhang Kai, director of the Shandong provincial environmental protection bureau.

The pollutants contained in the contaminated water, nevertheless, turned out to be higher than expected. The density of main oil spilt was 1.4 milligrams every litre, or 27 times above the national standard.

Zhang acknowledged that Shandong has made full preparations to cope with the pollution spilt and shut down all 63 water-collecting stations along the Yellow River.

Shandong Provincial authorities had reported the pollution spilt to the national State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) and sent experts to tackle the water pollution problem on Sunday, the official said.  

(Xinhua News Aency January 9, 2006)