SARANAC LAKE – Vandals damaged vehicles and dumped buckets of used oil in the Petrova Elementary School/Saranac Lake Middle School maintenance yard sometime Saturday, triggering an oil spill in the nearby Saranac River.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation worked to contain the spill, and village police are investigating the vandalism.

“So far we haven’t identified anybody that’s responsible, but we have collected a significant amount of evidence, so we’re hoping that might give us a lead,” Chief Charles Potthast Jr. said this morning.

A passerby spotted rainbow-colored swirls in the river just below the LaPan Highway bridge Saturday afternoon and reported it to 911. Franklin County Emergency Services passed it on to the Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department at 3:28 p.m. Second Assistant Chief James D’Ambro and Ken McLaughlin said they were among five or six members who responded.

They eventually traced the sheen back to an eddy where a culvert flows into the river from Dorsey Terrace, just upstream from the bridge.

They reported it to DEC’s spill response unit around 4:30, D’Ambro said.

“We don’t have the proper resources to handle something of that magnitude,” he said.

The rainbow-colored oily sheen was clearly visible on the river all through the village, including below the Pine Street bridge on the other side of town.

D’Ambro said the swirling leak had diminished and then increased in volume as they watched it over the course of an hour or so. He said there wasn’t much the fire department could do except pass the situation on to the DEC.

“Honestly, I hate calls like this,” he said. “The unknown – it’s kind of scary.”

By supper time, a DEC spill response engineer was working to contain the leak, which had been flowing for more than two hours. DEC environmental engineer Benjamin Hankins arrived from his home in the Plattsburgh area at 5:40 p.m. and immediately put a floating boom in the river to contain the oil. That seemed to limit the flow, although petroleum still shimmered in the eddy.

Hankins said he wasn’t allowed to speak to a reporter and referred inquiries to a DEC press officer. He left briefly but returned to the scene before 6:30 p.m.

The leak was eventually traced back to the school’s maintenance yard, according to Superintendent Diane Fox. She said school officials were contacted around 10:30 p.m. Saturday.

“Upon investigation, it was discovered that two containers of used oil had been moved from their original temporary storage location and tipped over, causing the contents to leak,” Fox said in a statement. “A full investigation of the scene revealed there was significant vandalism throughout the maintenance area including damage to many of the vehicles that are stored there.”

Fox told the Enterprise this morning that she visited the site Sunday. She described the containers of used oil as five-gallon buckets that were closed, with screws on the spouts that had been deliberately opened and tipped over.

“There’s a storm drain there, and we had all that rain, and it ran down the hill and into the storm drain,” she said.

Six vehicles had visible damage, including broken mirrors and lights, Fox said, and the gas tank was open on a seventh vehicle. School officials are concerned something could have been put in the tank, so they’re having it cleaned out.

The maintenance yard, located next to the school’s gym, is usually not locked, Fox said.

“It’s our pellet boiler in there, so in an emergency you’d want crews to have immediate access to that. We store big things in there, so no one is going to just walk in and take something. It’s gated, and the gates are closed, but it’s not locked.”

Fox said she didn’t know who’s responsible. People were in the building during the day on Saturday, and a staff member who was in the maintenance yard Saturday morning didn’t notice anything amiss.

Potthast said his department was notified sometime Saturday night. He said police collected evidence and conducted “numerous” interviews.

“We’re going to keep pursing the case,” he said.

Fox said DEC put floating booms in the storm drains, in addition to the river. She said a DEC spill response crew would be back on the scene today.