Spain's shellfish industry at risk from toxic chemical plant leak
Pastor Dale Morgan
Spain's shellfish industry at risk from toxic chemical plant leak*
Dale Fuchs in Madrid
Monday September 4, 2006
The Guardian
A coating of toxic chemicals has spread at least two miles along a river
in Spain's shellfish centre, Galicia, killing hundreds of fish and
cutting off drinking water to an estimated 100,000 people.
The cloudy, turquoise slick was caused by a fire at a chemical plant on
Friday, regional officials said, and it threatens to ooze down the Umia
river to the Arosa estuary on the country's craggy north-west coast.
The spill is the second environmental disaster to hit the rural region
this summer, which saw 2,000 forest fires ravage about 300 square miles
of trees in two weeks - the worst outbreak of forest fires in 20 years.
The slick also occurred just as Galicia's cold waters were beginning to
recover from the 2003 spill by the Prestige oil tanker.
This weekend's spill is much smaller than the Prestige - only about
150,000 litres of chemicals reached the water, according to Perico
Alonso of Erva, a local environmental group. But it contains
carcinogenic petroleum derivatives, and the regional environmental
minister, Manuel Vázquez, told reporters that it would cause "elevated
mortality".
The government has shut down two shellfish banks at the river mouth as a
precaution. Officials are trying to filter the river speckled with dead
fish and seal off contaminated water. Residents stocked up on bottled
water yesterday as samples were tested. Environmentalists called for
stricter laws to keep chemical plants away from environmentally
sensitive land.
Galicia is one of the world's leading producers of mussels and shellfish
farmers are watching the spill nervously. The slick is 10 miles from
2,000 wooden docks that are used to raise mussels, a mussel farmer, Anxo
Gómez Figueira, told the Guardian.
Mr Gómez said about 10,000 people earn a living on the estuary, most of
them in small family businesses like his own, in which "mother and
daughter, father and son and cousins work side by side". The docks
produce about 200,000 tonnes of mussels a year.