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SAN FRANCISCO — Salvage workers will plunge into the ocean 17 miles southwest of the Golden Gate Bridge on Saturday to recover thousands of gallons of oil from a ship that sank in 1953. 

The rescue crew will operate from a 400-foot-long barge to remove oil from the SS Jacob Luckenbach, according to Richard Fairbanks of Titan Maritime, the company that will conduct the operation. 

The ship sits in 175 feet of water, and has been leaking oil for the past decade. The Coast Guard and state officials in February blamed the ship for mysterious oil slicks that have killed thousands of seabirds from Monterey Bay to Sonoma County.