Before and after satellite photos of the Mount Polley tailings pond spill

Michael Allan McCrae | August 14, 2014 | 9:08 pm Base Metals Precious Metals Canada Copper Gold 

Before and after satellite photos of the Mount Polley tailings pond spill show a destructive path down the length of Hazeltine Creek.

The tailings pond dam at the Mount Polley Mine site was breached on BC Day, Aug. 4. An estimated 10 million cubic metres of water and 4.5 million cubic metres of fine sand was released. Hazeltine Creek, which was originally about 1.2 metres wide, grew to 150 metres wide. It is the grey stream flowing into Quesnel Lake.

The image, originally posted by geomatics firm Effigis, was taken by a Landsat-8 satellite on July 29 and August 5, 2014, a day after the event.

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12 Comments

  • Waz

    So hard to match the photos!

    • SRM

      you slide the center line side to side to compare.

  • Wee

    There is a slider you move back and forth on the image to see the difference. I had trouble with that as well.

  • LAMB

    Thanks WEE – at first I could see no difference then slid the line left/right to see the stark difference. Quite dramatic.

  • CN

    Interesting, I did download SRTM data and worked out possible path, and came up with two paths depending on the area of dam wall breach. And my one path matches perfectly what I see from this image. J_reay there is no point of shooting environmental engineer. There area many parties involved in the stability of these structures. In some cases possibly this also, management is a problem. Many times they are advised of possible problems if they don’t approve expenditure for expansion or stabilization of dams as more tailing keep loading them and they sometimes tend to take risks for things they shouldn’t be taking risk.

  • Roberto

    Easy to see the impact in the border of the Hazeltine Creek and the path down the spill, in a couple months ahead it will be easier to distinguish the impact in the fauna and flora with these kind of image. Lack of Management? unnecessary risk? lack of operation? probably all of them.

  • Ricardo

    An environmental disaster, true and comes at the worst possible time for the industry, already hit with multiple wammies. So easy for the armchair experts to lay the blame and usually at the expense of the Environmental Engineer, who is governed by governmental regulations, Management and the Board of Directors. Perhaps all these armchair experts should wait for the details of the cause of this accident before jumping to conclusions about who is responsible.

  • Dick Weed In The Know

    This is impossible to comprehend!! Who ever isued the permit should be through into the middle of the mess and made tread in it for as long as he shall continue to live, the SOB!!!

  • Gregory Beckstrom

    This is bad and I won’t gloss over that point, but the area will recover over time. We overestimate our power as humans and underestimate the ability of natural processes to recover from man made wounds and naturally occurring disasters.

  • BillHK

    Both lakes changed colours quite dramatically. How can they say that the water is now already “safe”?

  • QF8424 Dubai to Perth

    What a piss poor excuse of a dam wall for that much content.

  • Guest

    looks like they have a sandy beach now

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