Mexico’s state-owned oil company said it found four more illegal taps drilled into pipelines by fuel thieves at year’s end. Petroleos Mexicanos said none of the taps caused leaks or spills. Two of the improvised taps were found in a gasoline pipeline in the northern state of Sinaloa. Another tap was found in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz.
A fourth tap was found in the north-central state of Guanajuato, when police noticed a tanker truck filled with diesel sitting in a field. The year-end announcement came after a December 19 explosion at a pipeline killed 29 people. Pemex officials said that explosion was apparently caused by an illegal tap. Pemex suffered more than 614 thefts from pipelines in 2010.
