Emergency management officials say it may take a week or more to clean up an oil spill in a waterway in a southwestern Lamar County.

Emergency Management Director James Smith said a pipeline crossing a small stream ruptured overnight Tuesday. He said officials believe between 400 to 450 barrels, or about 20,000 gallons, of oil were released into the stream.

The waterway eventually flows into the Clear Creek, which joins the Pearl River in Marion County just north of the Mississippi-Louisiana state line.

Smith said environmental crews set up a perimeter at least a mile downstream from the spill to collect the oil. Clean up continued Thursday.

Smith said he does not believe there is a risk to residents.

“It is all surface water that is affected, and it is contained to the creek itself,” Smith said in a www.hattiesburgamerican.com article. “There appears to be no harm to residents in the area.”

The pipeline is owned by the Ridgeland-based Tellus Operating Group. The company is working with environmental officials to clean up the site, Smith said.