The love Canal story.

[Pierce Brosnan]

This is old news, but maybe some of you never really got the whole story.  I just think it's kind of wild, abandoned neiborhoods, and shit like that.  This was some college students research paper.  All the facts are there.



What Happened at Love Canal?


Alfred University
NYS College of Ceramics
Saxon Drive
Alfred, NY 14802
Abstract

Love Canal in Niagara Falls, New York became infamous in the late 1970s, when years of illness, odors, and seepage culminated into a revelation of a massive toxic waste dump.
Hooker chemical, responsible for the dumping urged the city to forego plans to develop the site after it was sealed. It was built up regardless and became one of the engineering and environmental disasters of the century.
History
The Trouble Begins
Love Canal Today
Who to Blame
References


Here's the Story

The History:

Love Canal was a typical Niagara Falls neighborhood. Neat rows of houses, a large park, a winding creek, and an elementary school that welcomed 500 students each September. One characteristic that made the area unique was the strange odors that often hung in the air. In 1978 a newspaper article came out in the Niagara Gazette revealing the existence of a vast chemical waste dump in the Love Canal zone. Children were playing and being educated on a landfill. Many were becoming sick. Miscarriages, low birth weights, and birth defects were a common trait among Love Canal families. One child even died as a result of 1, 3, 7, 8- tetrachloro-dibezo-paradioxin poisoning. Dioxin, the worlds most potent and deadly carcinogen is estimated to be capable of killing over one million people with just three ounces. Over 130 pounds of the chemical were found in the canal. Yet dioxin was only one of the 248 buried chemicals totaling 20,000 tons of waste1. Serious questions were posed then and now as to why a school and a neighborhood would be built on a toxic dump; who is responsible; and why no one was told.

Love Canal's history began with a dream of infrastructure and cheap hydro- electric power. William Love, in 1892 envisioned and began to dig a canal from the upper Niagara River to the lower river. The economy shortly failed and with it the canal sank into oblivion and memory before it reached a mile's length. In 1920 the land was sold at auction to Hooker Chemical to be used as a municipal and chemical disposal site. For the next 30 years, the city of Niagara Falls, the US Army, and Hooker chemical dumped a plethora of toxins, waste, and garbage into the canal.

When in 1953, the canal was filled, Hooker used rather up to date methods to bury the canal. The dump was sealed with a thick layer of extremely hard packed, impermeable clay. The city eyed the area for urban expansion. It tried to buy the land from Hooker. Hooker, knowing the city's intent, gave strong warning to the city about the safety of the site. However, the city forced the sale through the use of the constitution's imminent domain clause. To protect themselves against indemnity, Hooker added a disclaimer to the deed warning of the danger and washing Hooker's hands of the site. The company would only accept one dollar for the site--the minimum for a binding contract-- likely as a show of disdain.

[Pierce Brosnan]

(cont.)




The Trouble Begins

It is probable the Niagara Falls school board simply did not understand the warnings, many though they were. The city began to dig, tearing and piercing the red clay cap at many sites in order to obtain fill and to lay sewer lines. Blocks of homes and an elementary school were built. From the 50s to the 70s, residents had noticed strange odors in the air, and unusual seepage in their basements and yards. Abnormally high incidences of reproductive disorders and urinary tract disorders were being noticed and finally catalogued by Lois Gibbs, the area's first and foremost activist. The school refused to shut its doors in 1978 when a child became violently ill (a chemical poisoning). Gibbs organized a petition and in August the NYS Health Department ordered the closing of the school (the first Love Canal victory)5.

Chemical residues had seeped from the canal into homes, sump pumps, through the school playground's soil, sewer lines, and into the creeks. Natural depressions in the ground call swales, carried larger quantities of chemicals to certain areas. Gibbs and her fellow residents had to hold two EPA officials hostage before President Carter provided funds to move the more than 900 families away from the area. 5 . In 1983 a lawsuit against Occidental Chem. Corp. (Hooker's parent company) was settled for a little under $20 million. Five years later, after extensive testing the area was still declared uninhabitable by NYS Dept. of Health. In 1990 nine homes on the cleaned up edge of Love Canal went up for sale. Ralliers from across the state and nation protested the resettlement5 . Now, the vast majority of the remaining homes are on the market and the neighborhood is waking from a twenty year death-like sleep.

Love Canal Today

The canal had again been sealed and a 16 acre area surrounded by an eight foot barb wire fence6. The surrounding area has been cleaned and is most likely safe. None of the chemicals have been removed from the canal, however. They have only been buried once more. The stigma attached to the area (renamed Black Creek Village for a new image) ran so deep that banks refused mortgages on Love Canal homes. Occidental Corp. agreed to pay over $230 million dollars to the state and federal governments to reimburse clean-up costs. They have since taken over management of the waste treatment facility at the canal.

Love Canal, intended to be a source of power and navigation, was decomposed to a waste dump which perhaps has forever scarred the city of Niagara Falls. Love's vision was overtaken by Hooker Chemical as a dump. Hooker had no intent to ever have the land inhabited by anyone in the foreseeable future.

[Pierce Brosnan]

(cont)



Who's to blame?

The majority of the chemicals were pesticide waste and chemical weapons research (e.g. Manhattan project). When the 3000 foot long, 60 foot wide, and 40 foot deep canal was filled; Hooker took great caution in sealing it. The seal was so hard that it broke the city developers drill bits and impeded backhoes when they first attempted to take the clay for fill. The Hooker engineers knew what they were dealing with and worked to safely contain the chemicals with the most advanced methods of the time period. They were, after all, dealing with enough dioxin alone, to kill nearly 700 million people. Hooker apparently warned rather strongly against any development of the land. In the face of imminent domain, and the "sound clay cap", there was little for Hooker to do accept clear their name in the event of any mishaps. To have followed the engineering codes of ethics, they could have taken the city to court over the imminent domain issue. They likely could have done more, but at possible loss to their enterprise.

The state and the city were the bulldogs who forced the sale of the land and broke the seal. They had been warned. The city's construction engineers should have known what they were doing when they dug away at Hooker's clay seal. Perhaps they were never told of the dump; but to have lived in the city and never have known a dump existed is hard to swallow. The government, after much pressure from citizens, as well as numerous EPA cover ups, acted and paid to have the area cleaned up and periodically tested.



The government was prompted to start a program called Superfund to aid in the clean up of such disasters. The program was composed of a measly budget and pushed the clean up bill on to the tax payers. The fund was highly ineffective and barely covered up the contaminates. Rita M. Lavelle, head of Superfund, was fired by Reagan in 1983 and served four years in prison for lying about the use of funds at love canal3. Three other high ranked EPA officials were forced to resign in connection with the incident. Local officials desire for city expansion and profit resulted in a travesty 25 years later that helped spur the decline of the once prosperous city of Niagara Falls. Occidental eventually agreed to foot part of the bill, but only years later. Hooker's engineers and management are not the only one's responsible for this mess. The city used the constitution against them to prevent their intervention.

The city politicians, and officials pushed a program overlooking the consequences to the health, safety, and well being of the general public. Personal gain was placed before reason and civil employees responsibility to serve their constituents. Non-engineers acted in a gross manipulation of the constitution. Politicians, against engineers warnings, meddled and laid the seeds for a tremendous disaster. They knew the situation, they acted regardless, and they covered it up for twenty five years.