TOPIC:

Yeah, there was no testing of dead perch for chemical because no dead perch were found

A few points of order, since there have been a LOT of folks talking about the purported perch kill being linked to the chemical spill

1) no concrete evidence it was a fish kill, myself and others believe it was a picture of the perch boils that have been happening all winter. See: chicago.suntimes.com/sports/sorting-out-...boil-or-a-fish-kill/

2) The chemical leak started Tuesday. The purported fish kill was a full week before the leak. It couldn't have killed the perch because the perch event was before the chemical event

3) The chemical leak was 20 miles away from the 87th St Slip, and the prevailing currents would take the chemical the opposite direction from the 87th street slip

4) Even if all those things weren't true, the chemical would very likely be diluted too much to have a large fish kill 20 miles away

5) and if it WAS strong enough to have a huge fish kill 20 miles away, there would be massive fish kills for 20 miles all along the lake shore, which have not been observed

So in summary: there probably wasn't even a perch kill, and it's a complete coincidence that the chemical issue happened a week later

Good job explaining. 2 separate events.

I love how people talk about how these companies shouldn't be allowed to pollute our waterways and play the blame game. Being someone who has worked the process side of industry can tell you they ARE NOT allowed to pollute the lake or land I'm sure there were engineering designs and safe guards that failed before this happened. This sucks and I'm no way saying USS is innocent because I don't know how often they PM things or spend their budget on upgrades but I don't think this was done on purpose knowing the risk of failure. Also, the people who say well these places shouldn't be around our natural resources yet enjoy and embrace the luxury of having everything the steel mills and refinery produces on a daily basis. The fact of the matter is what happened, happened, it's terrible and I wish it didn't happen since I own a home in Ogden Dunes and one in Portage both get water from the lake, one has been directly effected from this. I can just hope fishing isn't ruined for a while, mother nature will hopefully be able to heal herself, and USS will look at all their hazardous systems and do a risk analysis on everything and spend the money to upgrade all of these systems with secondary or eve more safe guards to keep shit out of our water and soil from now on.

Does anyone know if the fish in the area of the ditch are safe to eat? Will we be catching and eating at our own risk? I don't think it is possible to clean this up like an oil spill. The lake will eventually disperse this chemical on it's own, but how long will it take? I have not heard of any fish consumption warnings. I have not heard of any fish kills. I know about the beach closings, but nothing about eating fish. Maybe I missed something?

I have gotten a couple of inquiries about the spill from my customers. So rather than write them each a separate response, I wrote a blog and posted it at www.brothernature.info. No whitewash, but also no enviro-hype.

Companies and agencies now always err on the side of caution. For instance, when I was a kid, I went 12 years of riding the school bus - never one fog delay. No such thing. Nowadays, fog delays are common. Err on the side of caution.

I can only think if there were a chance of danger from tooling down the ditch - even to get to clean water in the lake - we'd be shut down.

Not saying it's good or unimportant. I'm not overly concerned and will continue to fish out of Portage.

This article has some general information I haven't read in other places.

www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-chromium-...-20170412-story.html

I guess the part that bothers me the most right now is the fact of not getting any information on how much chrome leaked thru.

The mill would have to had paper work on how much they were holding in their holding pond. Because of federal numbers that the mill must not go over and federal equipment that picks up the slightest sneeze of chrome, why is there no body mentioning how much leaked. Not even a guess. They don't say where the broken pipe was. Was it inside the utility plant(treatment), or from the holding pond, or somewhere else? How much other chemicals were used to offset the chrome? That would be a indicator. We got lucky with having a ditch filled with high water and flowing out good. There would of been no way to contain any of it. The dishcharge that is around 100 yards from the mouth is were the leak would of been discharged from.

From the NWI Times, 4/14:

www.nwitimes.com/news/local/illinois/epa...24-17ccb1ecffea.html

"Chicago conducted its own sampling near its water intake 1 mile from the spill site and detected a hexavalent chromium level of 2 parts per billion, EPA said.

Normal levels range between 0.14 to 0.15 parts per billion, according to Chicago's Water Management Department. The current federal drinking water standard for total chromium, which includes the more toxic form, hexavalent chromium, is 100 parts per billion, according to the EPA's website."

SO the water is well below the federal limit 1 mile away.

I'm confused...the closet Chicago intake is the 68th street crib which is 20 miles away. Chicago doesn't have anything within 1 mile of the spill site.

Even though the numbers are under EPA guidelines, to jump from .14-.15 parts per billion to 2 parts per billion is a significant jump, about a 1200% increase. Especially if the testing was indeed 20 miles away.

response.epa.gov/site/site_profile.aspx?site_id=12130

DATA SHOW NO CHROMIUM IN WATER per the EPA

It's ok to fish.

Thanks to USS for calling the EPA, the leakage must have been so small it turns out mostly a false alarm.