AN INVESTIGATION is to be launched after an oil spill in Liverpool’s docks complex.

A major clean-up operation is now under way after around 250 tonnes of heavy fuel oil escaped after a boat hit part of a dock.

The spill was boomed off and no oil has entered the River Mersey.

The clean-up operation is expected to take up to two weeks to complete, with Langton Lock - used to access the river - currently closed to shipping.

However, Port of Liverpool said no cruise operations would be affected by the oil spill.

A Fred Olsen cruise liner, Boudicca, is due to berth in Langton dock on December 21.

A worker at the docks complex, who asked not to be named, said: “There are big pools of oil floating on the water and people are out in orange boats trying to clean it up with buoys and booms.”

The oil spillage was close to the internationally protected Seaforth nature reserve, and a small number of black-headed gulls roosting on the ice were reported to be slightly “oiled.”

Tim Melling, senior conservation officer for the RSPB, said: “The spillage shouldn’t have an enormous impact, but if the dock gates were to be opened and the oil got out into the open sea, it would have a seriously devastating effect.”