OLIVER RÁCZ - TOP Recommended Websites

*and heavy metals!
Baia Mare (RO), 30 th January 2000
Gold reprocessing facility,
leak of a tailing pond
378 500 liters toxic
sludge (8g KCN /l)*
River Lapus Somes
Tisza (February 3, 12 mg/l;
590 km of very sensitive
ecosystem)
Danube (end of February
till higher than 0.1 mg/l )
• More than 100 tons of dead fish,
some of them rare and
endangered species.
• Other water animals killed too -
frogs, crabs, insects, etc.
• Secondary intoxication &
perishing of otters, beavers,
birds, dogs
• Cyanides are unstable
• Danger of ecological
catastrophe
• Monitoring & prevention in the
future
Purvis A.: Deadly Discharge. Time 155, 2000, No 6; February 28, p.26
Bombová E., Kupcová M.: V zápase s kyanidom v riekach život azda celkom neprehrá. SME 22.2.2000
Further examples
• Contergan, thalidomid, 1957 - 1961
– 2625 cases of birth defects (phocomelia)
• Seveso, Italy, 1976 (& in Vietnam war)
– DIOXIN ➡ SKIN, LIVER, BRAIN (CUMULATIVE)
• Bhopal, India, 1984, Union Carbide
– CH 3 -N=C=O (methyl isocyanate)
– 7000 residents died within days, 500 000 affected,
many survivors remain ill or disabled after 15 years
• Asbestos - Lung Ca, bankruptcy of Lloyd‘s