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Image from Cariboo Regional District’s YouTube channel
A night time breach at Imperial Metals’ Mount Polley Mine tailings pond has resulted in a large debris field and water ban in the British Columbia interior affecting 300 residents.
Vancouver Sun reports that about 5 million cubic metres of contaminated water were released at the Imperial Metals’ operation.
Aerial footage of the Mount Polley tailings breach >>
The Cariboo Regional District say the effected waterways are Quesnel Lake, Polley Lake, Hazeltine Creek and Cariboo Creek. The water ban includes recreational activities. The small town of Likely, BC, at the head of Quesnel Lake, is near the mine.
The Cariboo Regional District warns that the area is unstable, especially at the base of the debris flow. People are strongly advised to stay away from this area on foot, by vehicle or by boat.
Campers near the immediate area were evacuated by rescue personnel. There were no reports of injuries.
Image showing debris field from Cariboo Regional District Emergency Operations Centre
Imperial Metals’ (TSE:III) Mount Polley Mine is a open pit copper and gold operation in south central British Columbia. Last year the mine produced 38.5 million lbs of copper and 45,000 oz of gold. The mine commenced operations in 1997.
After the tailings dam broke, slurry and debris flowed down Hazletine Creek to where it meets Quesnel Lake. The sudden release of water was so great that Hazleton Creek, which was originally about four feet wide, is now up to 150 feet wide.
Updates are available at the Cariboo Regional District’s Emergency Operations Facebook page.
Image from Cariboo Regional District
Image from Cariboo Regional District YouTube channel
Image from Cariboo Regional District’s YouTube channel
Image from Cariboo Regional District’s YouTube Channel
Image from Cariboo Regional District’s YouTube channel
Story has been updated as more information is available.
DISCLOSURE: The reporter Michael McCrae is an investor in Imperial Metals.
11 Comments
U308
I’d like to know why a perfectly good topographic low (Polley or Bootjack Lake) wasn’t used as the tailings facility. Was this a decision made by the regulators of the day to opt for a more risk adverse option in order to appease vocal opponents of lakes as tailings impoundments?
Also I found an article referring to a discharge permit that Imperial was tied up in consultation with in 2011? Was this put forward as a solution to help de-water the tailings storage area? Was it ever granted? If it wasn’t then I would put forth that the blame rests partly on the shoulders of those who fought it.
http://www.wltribune.com/news/131638813.html?print=true
Listen
If the tailings could not be managed, the mine should never have been permitted in the first place. More recent decisions of the environmental regulators are properly acknowledging the risks.
Betty Henderson
Oh you can bet your Boots the responsible Parties, including without a doubt , our Christy Clark Gov’t, will be in “cover your Ass mode”. Worth noting, the Mining Company of Record involved here, has NOT answered any inquiries up to this point. WHAT’S NEW??? Can you blame me for being so JADED? The more things change, the more they stay the same. There will be an inquiry, a study , finger pointing, Angry exchanges over WHO pays, bla bla bla. SAVE THE PLANET!!
Cheezychuck
BC is going to become a mining black hole. This tailings pond failure is all the ammunition required for the anti-mining set to say “see, we told you so”.
Add in recent Supreme Court First Nations decision.
Future mine approval now dead in BC.
Dinsdale Pirannha
This is criminal negligence of the highest order. Arresting the CEO of the company and the operations manager at the mine, appropriating all their personal assets and selling them off to mitigate a tiny fraction of the cleanup would be a good start.
Red Mitten
Polley Mine tailings pond dam had a minor breach a few months ago, according to employees. The pond had been increasing in size at an unsustainable rate. Imperial has been piling the dirt dam higher and higher to accommodate more and more sludge and had applied for a permit to release some water into the nearby lake. The people amd wildlife whose environment and lives are now ruined surely include all residents of the entire area, not just some mythical “the anti-mining set”. Lack of respect and compassion sure does help everyone deal with this disaster tho.
Rayban
This is really bad , damn the lousy monitoring . Damns should be managed to permit , not managed to need to dump . Damns should have Laser movement monitoring just like big open pits do to monitor the movement of pitwalls . As well earthen dams ….. are the heigth of folley . Earth moves too easy and turns to mud too easy and fails too big and easy . This is going to hurt everyone too much , damn it we must do a good job not a lousy job at mining .
Gary Hee
A rumor is that the mining industry is self regulating. Its a farce to have violators of the environment and secondary industry wipe out all of the small contract and supply businesses nearby just because the violator is a mining company. In other words, the recommendations by a mining safety consultant is not mandatory to implement safety measures. As a suggestion, I recommend that all toxic components of the tilling be changed into by-products by the mining company recycling executive committee and be re-used over again.
MIke B
How could the dam fail without warning? Was it not monitored? If tilt meters had been installed there would have been advance warning and a chance to remediate before the disaster occurred
the_unsilent_majority
Lax environmental laws today because harper’s omnibus bill passed in late Dec 2012, removing environmental protections as the CONs catered the environmental laws to accommodate Corporations. IdleNoMore began in Nov 2012 as a direct response to the omnibus bill. First Nations tried to say all along that IdleNoMore wasn’t just a native thing, but that the omnibus bill concerned everyone in Canada. And the mainstream media misled the Canadian public into thinking that IdleNoMore was about a chief on a hunger strike, which was a different issue altogether.
Istomin
A good design of the dam,
there is no risk of a crash. Bad – will crash