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Hungarian sludge spill reaches branch of Danube
By Marton Dunai
KOLONTAR, Hungary | Thu Oct 7, 2010 5:44am EDT
KOLONTAR, Hungary (Reuters) - A toxic red sludge spill from an alumina plant in western Hungary reached a side branch of the Danube, a major European waterway, on Thursday, the spokesman for Hungary's disaster agency said. Tibor Dobson told Reuters that crews were battling to reduce the spill's alkaline content, which was still at around pH 9 -- above the normal, harmless level of between 6 and 8 -- when it reached the Raba river at 0330 GMT (12:30 a.m. EDT) and the Mosoni-Danube, a southern branch of the main Danube river by 0730 GMT.
The Danube's main riverbed is about 20 km (12 miles) from the point where the pollution hit the Mosoni-Danube. Dobson said the spill had killed fish in the Marcal river first hit by the pollution, which poured out of a containment reservoir of an alumina plant on Monday. "The problem is the alkaline," he said, adding that crews had not yet seen fish dying in the Raba river. Pollution to rivers was seen as an environmental threat from the spill by Thursday, three days after a torrent of toxic red sludge tore through local villages, killing four people and injuring 120.
Three people were still reported missing. Hungary declared a state of emergency in three counties on Tuesday after the sludge -- waste from bauxite refining that has a strong caustic effect and heavy metal content -- struck Kolontar, Devecser and other villages. Prime Minister Viktor Orban visited Kolontar on Thursday and said there was no point in even removing the rubble from part of the village as it was impossible to live there again. "It is difficult to find the words. Had this happened at night, everybody would be dead," Orban told reporters.
"CATASTROPHE"
He reiterated that the disaster could not have been due to natural causes. "This is an unprecedented ecological catastrophe in Hungary. Human error is more than likely. The wall (of the reservoir) did not disintegrate in a minute. This should have been detected. We are fighting in order to stop the pollution before the Danube." MAL Zrt, owner of the alumina plant and burst reservoir, said on Tuesday there had been no sign of the impending disaster, adding that the last inspection of the reservoir on Monday had shown nothing wrong. Kolontar, about 160 km west (100 miles) of Budapest, lies closest to the reservoir of alumina maker Ajkai Timfoldgyar.
Disaster crews, military and local villagers were clearing away the rubble and searching for the three missing people. Many people had suffered from burns and eye irritations caused by lead and other corrosive elements in the m&d. The flood, estimated at about 700,000 cubic meters (24 million cubic feet), swept cars off roads and damaged bridges and houses. On Tuesday the government suspended production at the plant and police were investigating what may have caused the disaster. MAL reiterated on Thursday that it would like to restart production at its alumina plant at the weekend with a new sludge containment pond.
Lajos Tolnay, chairman of MAL, told business daily Vilaggazdasag that if the company were to stop operation, 3,000 jobs would be lost at the firm and at business partners. He said the plant could safely resume operations. But many people in Kolontar said they would not move back to their houses as they did not feel secure. "I hung in the sludge for 45 minutes... It had a strong current that almost swept me away but I managed to hang on to a strong piece of wood of the pigsty," said Etelka Stump. "But I could hardly breathe because that air, that smell, that froth really hit me. I know what it's like because I worked in the bauxite factory for 17 years."
(Reporting by Marton Dunai and Gergely Szakacs, Writing by Krisztina Than; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
