Fishing And Aquaculture Affected By Piney Point Spill usf.edu - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from usf.edu Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Contamination from Piney Point has been diluted in Tampa Bay, researchers say
Scientists say early effects of release were not widespread but questions remain.
Â
Updated Just now
Contamination levels in part of Tampa Bay have declined since the discharge of polluted water from the old Piney Point fertilizer plant site, researchers said Monday.
Initial results show the effects of the release in early April were relatively contained in an area of lower Tampa Bay, according to professors at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science. But many questions remain about the consequences of the spill on fish, seagrasses and what â if any â harm might emerge over time.
Piney Point reservoir a disaster waiting to happen
By Betsey Piette posted on April 23, 2021
For decades, capitalist industries have produced wastewater by-products without serious plans for how to dispose of them. Their contents are usually toxic, often radioactive and generally hazardous to surrounding communities where they are stored and to the larger environment should they be released accidentally or otherwise.
While there are many thousands of such hazardous sites across the U.S., it is rare that they make the news. Case in point is the reservoir on the former 676-acre Piney Point phosphate mine site near Tampa, Fla. A state of emergency was declared April 3 when the walls of the storage pool, holding water polluted with phosphate and containing radioactive materials radium and uranium, threatened to burst.
Will the Piney Point spill affect tourism this summer?
While the long term impacts of the spill have yet to be seen, the areaâs popular beaches have not been impacted and visitor numbers have stayed the same, county leaders said.
Â
Â
Aerial drone image of the Anna Maria Island Beach with surrounding homes pictured on Friday. [ LUIS SANTANA | Times ]
When the story went national, Captain Scott Moore began fielding calls.
After millions of gallons of wastewater was released from the old Piney Point phosphate plant into Tampa Bay, tourists wanted to know if it was still safe to visit. They called Moore, who has been a professional fishing guide on Anna Maria Island for 40 years, asking if they would be able to swim and fish in the Gulf of Mexico.
Teams of scientists are keeping a close watch on the bay as they work to understand the impacts of so much polluted water flowing into the ecosystem.
Florida Department of Environmental Protection officials authorized the release of roughly 215 million gallons of wastewater from the Piney Point facility starting March 31 in an emergency response to a leak in a containment pond liner. That leak eventually became a breach, led to the evacuation of hundreds of Manatee County residents from their homes and businesses, local and state-level emergency declarations and the mobilization of a $200 million effort to close Piney Point once and for all.