On May 14.10
Phosphorescent orange gunge flows freely from park into Lake Ontario
The Gulf of Mexico has a disastrous oil-spill to deal with. But good old Lake Ontario has to suffer a few man-made indignities of her own. A couple of weeks ago, I happened upon a noxious-looking, oily, phosphorescent orange liquid oozing out of a large drainage pipe on the beach at Oshawa’s Lakeview Park and making its way across three or four feet of sand before entering the lake. In a quixotic attempt to do my civic duty, I contacted environmental officials with the regional, provincial, and federal governments to raise the alarum. None of them were initially inclined to take meaningful action. (I simply suggested that someone familiar with hazardous substances inspect the leak and take a sample for chemical analysis.) Indeed, one spokesperson, who was remarkably short on tact, proffered the sarcastic rejoinder that if the public wants the provincial government to test possible contaminants, we should first be prepared to pay higher taxes. (Hmmm…) Anyway, action was finally taken — perhaps giving credence to the old adage that squeaky wheels get the grease, even if leaky pipes do not. Apparently, the pipe opening was temporarily sealed, the pipe contents were sucked up by a vacuum truck and taken away to points unknown, and whatever residue is left will be flushed out of the pipes – right out into the lake, one supposes. Best of all, samples were finally taken for analysis. Let’s hope it doesn’t come back positive as concentrated death, as an unknown quantity of it made its way into the lake before anyone in officialdom lifted a finger to investigate. Their sudden flurry of belated activity suggests that the powers that be shared my concerns that the stuff entering the lake certainly looked toxic! A photograph of ‘the Blob that Got Away’ accompanies this post, in case you’re curious about what you’ve been drinking lately.
Postscript (on June 27.10): It seems that a number of chemical analyses were done. Most organic chemicals apparently came back below detection levels. Some coliform bacteria was detected, but, apparently, not in dangerous amounts. (According to an Ontario Ministry of the Environment spokesman, coliform bacteria is present in most water.) The samples tested as “rather high” in iron, manganese, zinc, and chlorides. Provincial staff are still assessing what the various materials identified in the test samples are actually from, though they think the source is unlikely to be paint (which is what the orange liquid resembled). When I pointed out that the orange gunge was still there (and full of dead gnats, for whom it had proved lethal) several weeks after the pipe was supposedly flushed-out, provincial staff revealed that the one hundred feet of the pipe closest to its terminus on the public beach had not been flushed after all, since city equipment could not reach it. Thirsty, anyone? (Lake Ontario is the source of drinking water for millions of people.)
© 2010 by John Arkelian.
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