An oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that soiled beaches, killed wildlife and sparked outrage from environmental groups was caused by a leaky pipeline owned by state oil company Petroleos Mexicanos, the company said.
A government investigation determined that an undersea pipeline near the Abkatun offshore platform was the cause of the leak, Pemex Chief Executive Officer Victor Rodriguez said at a press briefing on Thursday evening. Three employees were fired as a result of the accident, he added.
The amount of crude that spilled into the Gulf is still being determined, Mexico’s Science Minister Rosaura Ruiz said at the same press conference. The oil facility is close to the Bay of Campeche, off the Mexican coast.
The spill, which spread from Mexico’s southern Tabasco state to as far north as Tamaulipas, underscores Pemex’s struggles to clean up its environmental track record after repeated disasters, explosions and accidents in recent years. Those events have compounded the company’s financial woes as it seeks to reverse slumping production and emerge from under more than $85 billion in debt.
Mexico’s government began investigating the cause of the leak last month, initially suggesting that natural oil seepages, illegal dumping from tankers or faulty Pemex infrastructure could be to blame. Environmental groups argued that faulty facilities were the most likely cause of the pollution.
Environmental groups including Greenpeace and the Mexico Alliance Against Fracking have estimated that at as much as 800 tons of hydrocarbons have spilled into the Gulf as a result of the accident.
Photograph: Crude oil slicks on a beach in Alvarado, Veracruz state, Mexico, on March 24, 2026; photo credit: Victoria Razo/AFP/Getty
Copyright 2026 Bloomberg.
Topics
Energy
Oil Gas
Was this article valuable?
Here are more articles you may enjoy.
Interested in Energy?
Get automatic alerts for this topic.
