located about 150 miles down the coast from the site of that spill. this past weekend, oil was spotted as far as 200 miles away from the spill site at another state park along the coast. the immediate area of the spill may be in better shape than it was a week ago, but the oil is now apparently spreading. it was four years ago this month that the bp oil spill turned the otherwise rather pristine gulf of mexico into an environmental crime scene. it s now four years on from that disaster in the gulf, but oil-soaked tar balls are still washing up along the gulf coast from the bp spill. four years later, 300 pounds of tar balls were just discovered last week on one of mississippi s barrier islands. despite that, bp has now been given the green light to return to the gulf of mexico. last month, the u.s. government lifted its ban on bp and allowed them to start bidding again on new leases in the gulf of mexico. bp s new perspective neighbor in the gulf of mexico is now this guy.
happened with this material. and it is all caught on camera. october 4th, 2010 with, at an aluminum plant in hungary, a breach in the wall of a containment dam releases 3500 cubic feet of toxic red sludge. when it released, it created a flood that moved down the valley extremely rapidly. the residue known as red mud is a by-product of the aluminum creation process. to dispose of the red mud it is normally dried and covered with soil and grass. but today, it pours down on hundreds of unsuspecting citizens. the unstoppable rush of wave waste hits one town particularly hard. a tsunami-like wave moved and rose to a height of approximately two meters, especially in colin park, which was the village near to the spill site.
pools worth of toxic sludge into north carolina waterways, how has the governor from duke energy handled the matter? well, the spill began on super bowl sunday, february 2nd with tons of coal ash gunk just glunking out from the 48 inch storm water pipe at the downriver power plant. the sludge contain lead and arsenic and mercury and all of that stuff flowed out of the pipe for nearly a week. the people of north carolina were not told anything was wrong until a day after the pipe had ruptured and then both the company the and the state failed to relay accurately just how big the leak was. governor pat mccrory did not make any public statement about this disaster until four days after it happened. it happened on sunday. he didn t say anything on sunday. didn t say anything on monday. didn t say anything on tuesday. didn t say anything on wednesday. thursday, oh, there s the governor. finally. on day four, he showed up at the spill site and talked about how tough he s been on the industry
wednesday. thursday, oh, there s the governor. finally. on day four, he showed up at the spill site and talked about how tough he s been on the industry. and how they re going to have to clean this mess up. he put out a press release that day, governor mccrory directs duke energy to bring coal ash spill under control. the governor s press release telling people, as of thursday afternoon, downstream municipal water supplies remain unaffected and reporting that drinking water in their communities is safe to drink. that was from governor mccrory s office four days in this spill. well, now state health officials are saying not only do not drink water from the dan river, do not touch water from the dan river. certainly do not eat fish that have been in it. beware of the arsenic, copper, iron, aluminum in the water at levels above state standards for surface water quality. if you were going from pat mccrory s advice, safe to drink, everything s fine. it s hard to believe it s more unsafe n
after it happened and then finally he showed up at the spill site and pounded his chest and touted his record of being so tough on the energy. crowing that his administration was the first in north carolina history to take legal action against a company related to coal ash, right, by stepping in and blocking other lawsuits against the company and settling with the company for basically no money and no promise from duke energy to actually fix what they were doing wrong. this new reporting from the associated press about the state s role in blocking legal action against this industry, against this specific company, this new reporting raises questions about whether the sort of accident could have been prevented. one former regulator at the state s environmental agency amy adams, a nine-year veteran at the agency resigned in protest this past november over the direction the agency was taking since the new administration had been sworn in saying she was steered away from issuing violation