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The 2000 Baia Mare Cyanide spill was a leak of
''
'', December 13, 2004) spilled over some farmland and then into the Someș river.
Esmeralda Exploration blamed excessive snowfall for the dam failure.
Large numbers of fish died from the cyanide spill, affecting 62 species of fish, of which 20 were protected species. The Romanian government claimed that the fish had died of "cold", and that they were not at fault. In Hungary, volunteers participated in removing the dead fish to prevent the disaster from spreading across the food chain, as other animals, such as "Hungary appeals for ecological help"
''BBC'', February 15, 2000 Two years after the spill, the ecosystem began to recover, but it was still far from its initial state; the fishermen of Hungary claimed that their catches in 2002 were only at a fifth of their original levels.
''BBC'', March 14, 2000
''BBC'', February 16, 2000 The Hungarian government called the storing of cyanide next to a river madness and argued that the weather was not unprecedented. A
''BBC'', January 26, 2001 In mid-February 2000, as the spill reached the Romanian section of the Danube, the Romanian government temporarily banned fishing and the use of Danube water for drinking.
The 2000 Baia Mare Cyanide spill was a leak of cyanide
Cyanide is a naturally occurring, rapidly acting, toxic chemical that can exist in many different forms.
In chemistry, a cyanide () is a chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of ...
near Baia Mare
Baia Mare ( , ; hu, Nagybánya; german: Frauenbach or Groß-Neustadt; la, Rivulus Dominarum) is a municipality along the Săsar River, in northwestern Romania; it is the capital of Maramureș County. The city lies in the region of Maramureș ...
, Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...
, into the Someș River
The Someș (; hu, Szamos; german: Somesch or ''Samosch'') is a left tributary of the Tisza in Hungary and Romania. It has a length of (including its source river Someșul Mare), of which 50 km are in Hungary.gold mining
Gold mining is the extraction of gold resources by mining. Historically, mining gold from alluvial deposits used manual separation processes, such as gold panning. However, with the expansion of gold mining to ores that are not on the surface ...
company Aurul, a joint-venture of the Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
n company Esmeralda Exploration and the Romanian government.
The polluted waters eventually reached the Tisza River
The Tisza, Tysa or Tisa, is one of the major rivers of Central and Eastern Europe. Once, it was called "the most Hungarian river" because it flowed entirely within the Kingdom of Hungary. Today, it crosses several national borders.
The Tisza be ...
and then the Danube
The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...
, killing large numbers of fish in Hungary
Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...
, Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Bas ...
, and Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...
. The spill has been called the worst environmental disaster in Europe since the Chernobyl disaster
The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the No. 4 reactor in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near the city of Pripyat in the north of the Ukrainian SSR in the Soviet Union. It is one of only two nuc ...
.
Background
Aurul, the mine operator, is a joint venture company formed by the Australian company Esmeralda Exploration and the Romanian government. The company claimed it had the ability to clean up the toxictailings
In mining, tailings are the materials left over after the process of separating the valuable fraction from the uneconomic fraction (gangue) of an ore. Tailings are different to overburden, which is the waste rock or other material that overlie ...
at the Baia Mare mine, which had begun to be spread as toxic dust by the wind. Promising to deal with them and to extract remaining gold from them via gold cyanidation
Gold cyanidation (also known as the cyanide process or the MacArthur-Forrest process) is a hydrometallurgical technique for extracting gold from low-grade ore by converting the gold to a water-soluble coordination complex. It is the most commonly ...
, the company shipped its waste product to a dam near Bozânta Mare, Maramureș County
Maramureș County () is a county (județ)
in Romania, in the Maramureș region. The county seat is Baia Mare.
Name
In Hungarian language, Hungarian it is known as ''Máramaros megye'', in Ukrainian language, Ukrainian as Мараморо́щ ...
.
Dam failure
On the night of January 30, 2000, a dam holding contaminated waters burst and of cyanide-contaminated water (containing an estimated 100 metric tons of cyanide"Map: Pollution hotspots"''
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...Effects
After the spill, theSomeș
The Someș (; hu, Szamos; german: Somesch or ''Samosch'') is a left tributary of the Tisza in Hungary and Romania. It has a length of (including its source river Someșul Mare), of which 50 km are in Hungary.Tisza
The Tisza, Tysa or Tisa, is one of the major rivers of Central and Eastern Europe. Once, it was called "the most Hungarian river" because it flowed entirely within the Kingdom of Hungary. Today, it crosses several national borders.
The Tisza be ...
, Hungary's second largest river, which then flows into the Danube. The spill contaminated the drinking supplies of over 2.5 million Hungarians. In addition to cyanide, heavy metals
upright=1.2, Crystals of osmium, a heavy metal nearly twice as dense as lead">lead.html" ;"title="osmium, a heavy metal nearly twice as dense as lead">osmium, a heavy metal nearly twice as dense as lead
Heavy metals are generally defined as ...
were also washed into the river and had a long-lasting negative impact on the environment.
Wildlife was particularly affected on the Tisza: on a stretch, virtually all living things were killed, and further south, in the Serbian section, 80% of the aquatic life was killed; 200 tons of it was the fish in these rivers.
Large numbers of fish died from the cyanide spill, affecting 62 species of fish, of which 20 were protected species. The Romanian government claimed that the fish had died of "cold", and that they were not at fault. In Hungary, volunteers participated in removing the dead fish to prevent the disaster from spreading across the food chain, as other animals, such as fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
es, otter
Otters are carnivorous mammals in the subfamily Lutrinae. The 13 extant otter species are all semiaquatic, aquatic, or marine, with diets based on fish and invertebrates. Lutrinae is a branch of the Mustelidae family, which also includes wea ...
s and osprey
The osprey (''Pandion haliaetus''), , also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk, is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor reaching more than in length and across the wings. It is brown o ...
s had died after eating contaminated fish.
After the cyanide entered the Danube, the large volume of the river's water diluted the cyanide, but in some sections it still remained as high as 20 to 50 times the maximum permitted concentration.''BBC'', February 15, 2000 Two years after the spill, the ecosystem began to recover, but it was still far from its initial state; the fishermen of Hungary claimed that their catches in 2002 were only at a fifth of their original levels.
Subsequent spills
Five weeks later, a spill of contaminated waters (this time with heavy metals) hit the region. A dyke burst inBăile Borșa Băile may refer to several places in Romania:
* Băile, a village in Balta Albă Commune, Buzău County
*Băile 1 Mai and Băile Felix, spas in Sânmartin Commune, Bihor County
*Băile Herculane, a town in Caraş-Severin County
*Băile Chirui, a ...
, Maramureș County
Maramureș County () is a county (județ)
in Romania, in the Maramureș region. The county seat is Baia Mare.
Name
In Hungarian language, Hungarian it is known as ''Máramaros megye'', in Ukrainian language, Ukrainian as Мараморо́щ ...
and 20,000 cubic metres of zinc, lead and copper-contaminated water made its way into the Tisza."Hungary demands action over pollution"''BBC'', March 14, 2000
Reactions
Brett Montgomery, the chairman of the mine operator, Esmeralda, denied responsibility, claiming that the damage of the spill has been "grossly exaggerated" and that the fish died in such numbers because of lack of oxygen due to the freezing of the river. A spokesman for the company later claimed that media reports from Hungary and Serbia are politically motivated and the fish were killed by spills from industrial plants along the Tisza, due to the dynamite explosions used to break the ice locks on the river or simply due to the raw sewage pumped into the river."Firm rejects cyanide damage claims"''BBC'', February 16, 2000 The Hungarian government called the storing of cyanide next to a river madness and argued that the weather was not unprecedented. A
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...
report on the disaster blamed the design faults at the mine."Second cyanide spill blights Romania"''BBC'', January 26, 2001 In mid-February 2000, as the spill reached the Romanian section of the Danube, the Romanian government temporarily banned fishing and the use of Danube water for drinking.
Legacy
Environmental groups, likeFriends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) is an international network of environmental organizations in 73 countries. The organization was founded in 1969 in San Francisco by David Brower, Donald Aitken and Gary Soucie after Brower's split with ...
and Greenpeace
Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by Irving Stowe and Dorothy Stowe, immigrant environmental activists from the United States. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth t ...
, argued that the disaster was another reason to ban dangerous mining technologies such as gold mining using the cyanide heap leaching
Heap leaching is an industrial mining process used to extract precious metals, copper, uranium, and other compounds from ore using a series of chemical reactions that absorb specific minerals and re-separate them after their division from other e ...
technique.
German metal band Rammstein
Rammstein (, "ramming stone") is a German Neue Deutsche Härte band formed in Berlin in 1994. The band's lineup—consisting of lead vocalist Till Lindemann, lead guitarist Richard Kruspe, rhythm guitarist Paul Landers, bassist Oliver Riedel, ...
produced a song about the spill, called "Donaukinder" (Children of the Danube).
Three attempts were made in the Parliament of Romania
The Parliament of Romania ( ro, Parlamentul României) is the national bicameral legislature of Romania, consisting of the Chamber of Deputies ( ro, Camera Deputaților) and the Senate ( ro, Senat). It meets at the Palace of the Parliament i ...
to ban gold cyanidation in Romania Gold cyanidation is a chemical process for extracting gold from low-grade ore. Used in Romania for decades, the process came into debate following the 2000 Baia Mare cyanide spill and proposal of the Roșia Montană Project, which would create the l ...
, none of which succeeded.
See also
*Val di Stava dam collapse
The Val di Stava Dam collapse occurred on 19 July 1985, when two tailings dams above the village of Stava, near Tesero, Italy, failed. It resulted in one of Italy's worst disasters, killing 268 people, destroying 63 buildings and demolishing eigh ...
* 1998 Residue dam wall collapse of the Aznalcollar mine
* Ajka alumina plant accident
Ajka () is a city in Hungary with about 35,000 inhabitants. It is situated in the hills of Bakony.
History
Around 1000 BCE, the area was inhabited by Celts. By the second century CE, the territory was conquered by the Romans. The Hungarians occu ...
References
{{coord, 47, 40, 00, N, 23, 35, 01, E, type:landmark_source:kolossus-nowiki, display=title Baia Mare Cyanide Spill, 2000 Gold mining disasters Mining disasters in Romania Pollution in Romania Baia Mare Cyanide Spill, 2000 Baia Mare Cyanide Spill, 2000Cyanide
Cyanide is a naturally occurring, rapidly acting, toxic chemical that can exist in many different forms.
In chemistry, a cyanide () is a chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of ...
Waste disposal incidents
2000 in the environment
Environmental disasters in Europe
Tailings dam failures
January 2000 events in Europe
2000 disasters in Romania