News In Brief

Spill from a plant in Canada blamed in death of 9 whales

The environmentalist group Greenpeace has blamed a 43-ton spill of wood preservatives at a local paint factory for the death of nine gray whales off British Columbia, based on autopsies on two of the whales. The toxic substances lay along the bottom in Boundary Bay, where gray whales suck up sediment like vacuum cleaners as they pass.

The Canadian government has already begun court action against the paint factory.