Baia Mare dam breach
The Baia Mare dam breach occurred on the evening of January 30, 2000 in Baia Mare (German Frauenbach ) in Romania . The rupture of a tailings dam resulted in a serious environmental disaster .
The dam breach
After heavy rains, the dam of a gold ore processing plant broke on January 30, 2000 at around 11 p.m. in the city of Baia Mare in northwest Romania . 100,000 m³, according to other information at least 300,000 m³, sodium cyanide liquor mixed with heavy metals flooded the adjacent area and reached the Tisza and Danube via the Săsar brook and the rivers Lapuș and Someș (Hungarian Szamos ) . On the afternoon of February 1, 2000, the wave of pollutants contaminated with around 100 tons of cyanide reached the border with Hungary , and after two weeks it flowed into the Danube. On February 28, 2000, after four weeks, she arrived after a total of 2000 kilometers of flow in the Danube Delta near Tulcea in Romania .
The breach in the dam was not closed until February 2, 2000 .
Data of the dam
The plant was 51 percent owned by the Australian company Aurul SA , a subsidiary of Esmeralda, and 49 percent owned by the Romanian state company Remin SA .
- Maximum storage volume: 1.6 million m³
- Area: 94 ha
- Dam length: 4000 m
consequences
An enormous fish death was the result. More than 1,400 tons of fish perished. It was the biggest environmental catastrophe in Eastern Europe since the 1986 reactor accident in Chernobyl and had serious consequences for the environment in Romania. The livelihoods of a few hundred fishermen along the Tisza in Hungary were destroyed. In some Hungarian cities, the drinking water supply was interrupted for several days. In Romania, the poison also flowed through ditches into the village of Bozânta Mare, located on the dam, and poisoned drinking water and the soil.
As a countermeasure, sodium hypochlorite was immediately added in order to oxidize the cyanide compound to form toxicologically harmless salts .
causes
The causes of the accident were a mixture of design flaws , a lack of control, insufficient risk management and extreme weather conditions. According to research by the investigative commission, a local ground failure probably caused the dam to overflow, which resulted in a 25 m wide and approximately 2.5 m deep breach. This could lead to an uncontrolled rupture, as there were no permanent security checks on the pipelines, deposits and the sedimentation basin . The exact point in time and the actual amount of water that had flowed out could only be estimated as there were no permanent measurements.
aftermath
The security measures for gold processing in Baia Mare have now been improved. An additional catch basin was built. The pipelines and the dam are now inspected and inspected every two hours so that leaks can be quickly identified and rectified. The cyanide concentration is also measured regularly.
Artistic processing
In 2009 the German NDH band Rammstein released a song called Donaukinder on their album Liebe ist für alle da as a bonus track , which deals with misfortune.
See also
literature
- Tailing Dams, Risk of Dangerous Occurrences, Lessons learned from practical experiences. Bulletin 121, UNEP, 2001, Paris
- APELL for Mining, Guidance for the Mining Industry in Raising Awareness and Preparedness for Emergencies at Local Level, Technical Report No. 41, UNEP, 2001, Paris
- Cyanide accident in Baia Mare, Romania, IAD, Limnological Reports, Volume 33, Proceedings 33rd Conference, Osijek, Croatia 2000
- Gold fever, Baia Mare. A local inspection two years after the cyanide disaster. Greenpeace ACT, December 2001 - February 2002.
Web links
- Three years after Baia Mare (PDF; 305 kB)
- Baia Mare, ten years later (PDF; 135 kB)