Some residents of Manatee County, Florida, were evacuated from their homes over the Easter weekend as officials cited fears that a wastewater dam could “spill at any time.” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis declare an emergency for the area on Saturday.
Provincial officials said the dam, located in the former phosphate processing plant in Piney Point, had a “significant leak”, according to CBS affiliate WTSP-TV. Manatee County Public Safety Department tell people near the plant to evacuate due to an “impending uncontrolled release of wastewater.”
“A portion of the delivery wall at the leak has moved laterally,” said Jake Saur, director of public safety, “which indicates that structural collapse could occur at any time.”
The Manatee County Department of Public Safety initially sent evacuation notices to those within half a mile of Piney Point on Friday, and by 11 a.m. Saturday, evacuation orders had been extended to people within one mile north of the piles of phosphogypsum – a fertilizer in the reservoir. waste products – and those within half a kilometer south of the site. Surrounding parts of the highway were also closed to traffic.
Compulsory evacuations were extended Saturday night another half mile west and one mile southwest of the site. The Manatee County Department of Public Safety said 316 households are within the full evacuation area.
Phosphogypsum is the “radioactive waste” left over after the processing of philosophical ores into a state that can be used for fertilizer, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.
“In addition to high concentrations of radioactive materials, phosphogypsum and processed wastewater can also contain carcinogens and heavy toxic metals,” the center said in a statement Saturday. “For every ton of phosphoric acid produced, the fertilizer industry creates 5 tons of radioactive phosphogypsum waste, which is stored in mountainous stacks hundreds of acres wide and hundreds of feet long.”
Manessae County Commissioner Vanessa Baugh said in a statement Saturday that the “public should heed the notice to avoid harm.”
Officials are on the premises engaged in a controlled release of water, about 22,000 liters per minute.
The water currently being pumped out by officials to prevent a complete collapse is a mixture of seawater from a local dredging project, stormwater and rainwater runoff. The water was not treated.
“The water meets the water quality standards for marine waters, with the exception of pH, total phosphorus, total nitrogen and total ammonia nitrogen,” the state said in a statement. “It’s slightly acidic, but not at a level that is expected to be worrying, nor toxic.”
Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried wrote a letter to DeSantis on Saturday requesting an emergency session of the Florida Cabinet to discuss the situation. She wrote that the leaking water was ‘polluted, radioactive waste water’, and noted that this leak was not the first property.
“For more than fifty years, this mining industry in Central Florida has caused numerous human health and environmental disasters and incidents,” Fried wrote. “There have been numerous, well-documented failures – which continue to this day – of the reservoir lining of the property, including leaks, poor welds, holes, cracks and weaknesses that existed before the current owner, HRK Holdings, was purchased, and since then aggravate.”
Video of a meeting of Manatee County commissioners provided insight into what happened before the leak. On Thursday afternoon, Jeff Barath, a representative of HRK Holdings, the company that owns the site, appeared emotionally upset as he briefed Manatee County commissioners on the situation.
“I’m very sorry,” he said. He told commissioners he had only slept a few hours that week because he was trying to rectify the situation, and said through tears that he had first noticed an increase in conductivity within the site’s collection system. said, provides drainage around the plaster stacks.
He said he immediately notified FDEP of his concerns.
“The water has changed around the seepage. We went into a very aggressive monitoring program,” he said to find out where the seepage came from.
They discovered that the south side of the stacking system had increased ‘conductivity’ and that the acidity of the water, which is usually about 4.6, had dropped to about 3.5, indicating a problem.
After a few days, the water chemistry did not improve and the flow of water increased in less than 48 hours from about 120 liters per minute to more than 400 liters per minute, Barath said. Last Saturday night, the flow rate increased to ‘rates I could not even estimate for you’, he said.
Water filled the stacks so fast that the ground began to rise, Barath said. This ‘bulge’ was temporarily stabilized, but then extended hundreds of feet.
Barath submitted a report to the state on March 26, according to the state-run “Protecting Florida Together” website, created by DeSantis to enable more transparency on state water issues.
“I expected the gypstack to destabilize very quickly, and recommended that we consider an emergency discharge,” he told commissioners. He said he feared that ‘too much pressure on the system’ would lead to ‘complete failure’.
“I spent most of my days and nights constantly watching all aspects of this gypstack system and identifying flaws in it,” he said, noting that failures “happen constantly, I mean hourly.”
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection has said it recommends the company take “immediate action” to prevent further leaks. On March 30, the department said “pipes are being repaired at the facility” and that controlled drains have been started to prevent pressure build-up.
However, based on Barath’s testimony at the meeting, the situation was far from over. He concluded his speech by saying that they were “doing everything possible to prevent a real disaster.”
On Friday, another leak was detected in the southern delivery area of the facility. Despite working overnight to try to stop these and other leaks, Jake Saur, director of public safety, told Manatee on Saturday the situation was escalating.