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Hungary evacuates village threatened by toxic sludge

09 October 2010 20:05 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. A Hungarian village deluged with red toxic sludge earlier this week has been evacuated after further damage to a burst reservoir at the centre of the deadly chemical spill was discovered, APA reports quoting guardian.co.uk website.
Prime minister Viktor Orban said the village of Kolontar, which lies next to the reservoir at the alumina plant in Ajka, was evacuated because it was "very likely" that an entire wall of the structure would collapse, releasing a fresh wave of the chemical effluent that has killed at least seven people.
"Cracks have appeared on the northern wall of the reservoir which makes it very likely that the whole wall will collapse," Orban said.
"The wall is in very bad shape. We have started to build dams in the direction of the populated areas to slow the flow of the material in case of a new incident."
The prime minister said experts estimated 500,000 cubic meters of red sludge could escape from the reservoir if the wall collapsed â€“ about two-thirds as much as in the initial spill.
"We have no exact information about the nature of the material because a catastrophe like this has never happened before anywhere in the world," Orban said. "We have only assumptions about how far and with how much force the material can come out of the storage container."
Orban also said there would be "very severe" consequences for those to blame for the disaster, adding that the incident could have been avoided.
"Hungary has never experienced any tragedy like that and we are all astonished," Orban said. "Human errors and mistakes must exist ... and the [legal] consequences will be very serious."
As well as the fatalities, around 150 people were injured by the spill of up to 700,000 cubic metres of red toxic sludge â€“ many receiving chemical burns.
Most of those killed were drowned or swept away in Kolontar as the sludge hit on Monday. The village is the closest to the reservoir, and would be expected to bear the brunt if there were a second spill.
But authorities said the concentration of toxic heavy metals where the sludge spill entered the Danube has dropped to the level allowed in drinking water, easing fears that Europe’s second longest river would be badly polluted.
The red sludge devastated creeks and rivers near the spill site and entered the Danube on Thursday, moving downstream toward Croatia, Serbia and Romania.
MAL Rt, the Hungarian Aluminum Production and Trade Company that owns the Ajkai Timfoldgyar plant where the spill occurred, has rejected criticism it should have taken more precautions at the reservoir.
Hungarian police have confiscated documents from the company, and the National Investigation Office is looking into whether human error was a factor in the spill.