NEW ORLEANS (AP) — An oil spill found in south Louisiana this week was caused by a contractor working on an environmental restoration project funded after the larger BP oil spill.

The Coast Guard learned Monday that roughly 5,300 gallons of crude oil had leaked into Bay Long, part of Barataria Bay.

NOLA.com/The Times-Picayune reports an excavating marsh buggy operated by Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. accidentally cut through a pipeline and released the oil while rebuilding Chenier Ronquille Island.

The $36 million barrier island reconstruction project is funded by part of the $1 billion that BP made available for early Natural Resource Damage Assessment projects a year after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig caught fire and sank in April 2010, releasing millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

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