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Ecological and Human disaster in Hungary

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sandbender

sandbender

Mod
Nov 29, 2004
7,808
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Scotland
Yesterday, about one hundred miles south of where I live, a huge lagoon of highly toxic liquid (created during the manufacture of Aluminum) broke its banks, flooding two villages and killing at least three people. Many folks have have suffered burns and eye injuries.

Photographs and story in English here.

Video footage in Hungarian at the MTV News site here.
 
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That really is a nightmare :(

Horrendous enough in the present, but is the pollution working it's way into the watercourses and is is long term toxic ?

Glad you're not in the midst of it.

atb,
M
 
Toddy said:
"...but is the pollution working it's way into the watercourses and is is long term toxic ?..."
Click to expand...

Yes long term toxicity will be a problem, the fluid contains lead and other heavy metals, the relevant authorities are attempting to prevent the pollution getting to the larger rivers and waterways.

When the dyke broke the initial torrent was strong enough to flatten buildings. The figures I'm hearing on the radio now suggest that approximately 600,000 cubic meters of fluid has now affected about forty square kilometers. The injured number well over a hundred, no word yet on numbers of livestock and wildlife killed.

The BBC have picked up the story and provide more info. here.

Toddy said:
"...Glad you're not in the midst of it..."
Click to expand...

Me too, hopefully it won't get into the main waterways, something similar happened in Romania a few years back and poisoned the Tisza river, that was terrible.
 
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Nasty, Basically the sludge is what is left after the bauxite ore is pre-treated to remove the Aluminium component. Al is quite hard toextract IIRC and the way to do itis not exactly clean on the environment. The sludge is basically hard to remove from water so it has to be left in lagoons to settle IIRC. Jeez! I did this in my first degree, mineral engineering, I've forgotten more than I learnt!! I think that's right.

Anyway nasty, nasty. I hope the authorities do everything they can.
 
southey said:
Is it my eyes or do the walls of the settling pools just look to be very tall and thin for what they are\were doing,
Click to expand...

You may have something there, some commentators are suggesting that the rated capacity of the lagoon was 200,000 cubic meters and that when the dam broke the lagoon actually contained close to a million cubic meters.
 
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Just been watching a bit on the early news, what a nightmare in the making.

It looks like the wall collapsed on a tight corner, and trying to judge the size of the wall from the photo it looks quite substantial "up top" but lower down just a soil bank.

It's going to take some cleaning up.

Definately a case of needing a grab bag to get out in a hurry if in the proximity of that disaster.

Wings
 
wingstoo said:
"...a case of needing a grab bag to get out in a hurry if in the proximity of that disaster..."
Click to expand...

Even that wouldn't have helped most, the nearest village was under a two meters of fast flowing liquid within minutes. Getting onto a roof or a second floor was the only way to avoid being burned or swept away.

The confirmed deaths so far...

An elderly woman who was crushed/drowned when her house collapsed when struck by the torrent.
A 35-year-old man who was killed when his vehicle was washed away.
A fourteen month old girl and her three year old sister were pulled from their mothers arms and swept away in the flood.

Six elderly villagers are unaccounted for and are presumed to be buried under the sludge.

Of the many people suffering from burns, eight are described as being in a serious condition.
 
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Nasty situation out there.

Looking at that photograph of the failed dam I have a few comments. The dam is pretty solid and I am really curious as to the cause of the failure. To me that looks like a reasonable size and build of dam for this purpose. The other is the debris strewn out in the photograph. If you look to the middle left of the photograph (enlarge it if needed) you will see some blocks of sediment that had delayerer. To me that just shows that the settling process in those lagoons is exactly the process that formed sedimentary rocks. Those blocks look almost to be sedimentary rocks and not just the waste burden of the bauxite ore. The other thing is the car on the dam at the left of the breach and the excavation equipment below the dam all give indications as to the size of the dam and the lagoon section behind it. This was a big site and a big incident. I hope those in the hospital in critical state recover and they find those people missing, even if it is only the bodies to bury.
 
The Lorax is one of my favourites. My line of work is clearing up messes like this. Industry all over the world carries on biggering their money without any real plan for the gluppity glup. Often a "treatment" lagoon is just somewhere to hide the problem until they can all retire to the Maldives.

Z
 
What a mess!! Do you know if they were successfull in building the second containement damn? I remember seeing it being build a few days ago because they feared there would be another breach, but havent seen anything on the news here to say if they managed. And is there any update on the impact on local wildlife yet?
Cheers
Ness :-)
 
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