thedailyreview.com
May 5, 2010
BURLINGTON - Some residents in Burlington Borough are dealing with a water mystery.
The matter came to the surface at the borough council meeting Tuesday.
According to council member Jerri Renzo, at least five residents on the Berwick Turnpike have been dealing with the problem for a year.
"We're finding like a grit in the bottom of our tub, which we never had before," she said. "We've always had iron, but we learned to live with that. But we've had problems with our water softener, so we had someone come and check it, and they said it was the water ... it wasn't that we needed a new one or anything like that."
She said her water was tested, and it showed high levels of magnesium and strontium. Now, she said they're buying bottled water to drink, noting it's an inconvenience and can be costly.
She said they just don't know what's causing it. "We don't know," she said. "We want to find out."
According to Renzo, the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) advised the residents not to drink it or brush their teeth or cook with it, so they're not ingesting it.
"We've never had good water in this town, no one has, but over the past year, it's gotten worse," she said.
Judy Parmenter said a test showed high levels of manganese, iron, sodium, and chloride in her water.
During the meeting, she showed a cup with a dark-colored residue in it from her water.
She thought about 10 people were affected in the borough.
But the residents may have an answer soon.
According to Parmenter, someone from state Sen. Gene Yaw's office informed her that John Hanger, DEP secretary, is reviewing the situation and maybe already delegating it to the proper people.
"We should be hearing from them in a week, we hope," she said.
"It's gets to be very smelly," she said of the water. "The smell is terrible, it goes through the whole house. It sometimes makes you nauseated. When you take a shower, sometimes it burns, sometimes it itches."
Hmmm... sounds familiar!"Some people got a rash, not all of us."
Parmenter said the whole experience has been inconvenient with having to get bottled water to use.
"I'm hoping they're (DEP) going to tell me that they're going to send in officials to help us find the cause, to help us find a way to clear it up and stop it from going to other residents."
and now... some things the Daily Review hasn't been reporting!
According to a report dated April 30, 2010, titled New York State Senator Antoine Thompson Makes a Second Fact Finding Trip to Towanda and Dimock, PA, on Thursday, April 29 Senator Thompson, Chair of the NY Senate Environmental Conservation Committee, went on a second fact finding trip to gas drilling sites in northern PA, heading a group of state senators, NYC DEP officials and an assembly person.
"As on the first trip, the morning was devoted to a Chesapeake-guided tour of one of their model well sites near Towanda PA. Mayor Calvin Tillman of DISH, Texas had been invited to join the group. At the 11th hour, the Senator's office received a call from Chesapeake, reportedly at the behest of influential NY O&G lawyer Tom West http://www.westfirmlaw.com/ that Mayor Tillman would not be welcome.
Michael Lebron, a principal of New Yorkers for Sustainable Energy Solutions State Wide (NYSESS) and a board member of Damascus Citizens for Sustainability (DCS), stepped in and took Mayor Tillman on a different tour: to locations where water well contamination has occurred in association with gas drilling activity by Chesapeake in Bradford County. In each instance, a pattern of contamination was described as follows: tap water would first turn black, then it would acquire a foul odor, and then methane levels increased to the point where the water could be lit. In one instance, the contamination occurred after a gas well was drilled one mile away. In another, it was reported that a one acre pond turned black, then became bubbly, and that electrical had to be cut off from a woodworking shop and a utility transformer moved across the street because methane levels risked an explosion."
CONTAMINATION: PLANK ROAD and VICINITY, TOWANDA, BRADFORD CO. PA
REPLACEMENT WATER TANK, LUCE PROPERTY, MAHONEY RD., TOWANDA
PLANK ROAD HOME WITH 2 "WATER BUFFALOS" AND 10' WELL VENT PIPEThe people of Towanda, and other communities in Bradford County NEED to know when and where wells and aquifers are being contaminated. This is a matter of public health and safety. And yet... the facts are not being reported to the public.
These are not the only instances of contamination in Bradford County. Why aren't they being reported?
Subsurface contamination can and does migrate. It can and has affected water wells at unpredictable distances from the gas drilling site. People, domestic animals and wildlife have become sickened or died of contamination resulting from gas drilling. This is a serious matter. It is hard to conceive that the daily newspaper is not striving to be vigilant and intent on keeping the people in the communities it serves informed and aware of potential dangers...
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This is absolutely unacceptable. So it looks like Towanda properties are now being contaminated and water supplies ruined. How is the word going to get out? The Raging Grannies need to come to Towanda and rage at the Chesapeake regional office.
ReplyDeleteGREAT IDEA!
ReplyDeleteAt times it happens that the area in which we live doesn’t suit our skin and hair. Moreover it is not of good quality and effects cooking and drinking. so this is very fantastic idea to use a water softener, Nice Post.
ReplyDelete