And you all thought it was over.........
Waste floating around world on barge since 1986 now in Florida
FORT PIERCE, Florida, May 02, 2000 (AP Worldstream via COMTEX) -- Some 14 years
after the original shipment of incinerator ash left Philadelphia, then was
rejected by port after port, 2,000 tons (1,820 metric tons) of the waste has
ended up in barges along the Florida coast.
Laboratory tests showed the ash is not hazardous waste, Kris McFadden of the
Florida Department of Environmental Protection said Tuesday.
However, there was still no definite word where the ash would end up. Florida
counties are refusing to transport the ash to their landfills.
The story began in 1985, when Philadelphia was searching for a place to put ash
from an incinerator in the city. More than 14,000 tons (12,740 metric tons) were
loaded onto a bulk-cargo ship, the Khian Sea, which in late 1986 began its
ill-fated voyage.
For more than two years, the ship sailed the Caribbean searching for a dump
site. Crew members reported being turned away from ports at gunpoint and being
threatened with attack by environmentalists, who maintained the ash contained
toxic heavy metals.
The Bahamas, Bermuda, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Guinea-Bissau and the
Netherlands Antilles all refused the ash.
In December 1987, the ship's crew unloaded nearly 4,000 tons (3,640 metric tons)
of the ash near Haiti's port of Gonaives. The ship's captain later testified
that he was ordered to dump the remaining 10,000 tons (9,100 metric tons) into
the Atlantic and Indian oceans.
In 1998, the 4,000 tons (3,640 metric tons) of ash in Haiti was ordered removed.
There was no immediate explanation as to where it has been since then or what
happened to the remaining 2,000 tons (1,820 metric tons).
On Monday, five barges loaded with the waste sat in Florida's Intracoastal
Waterway -- two at Fort Pierce and three at Stuart.
McFadden said Tuesday the material was being transferred from the open barges to
a ship with covered cargo compartments.
Waste Management Inc. is attempting find a home for the incinerator waste
somewhere in the Southeast, said company spokesman Bill Plunkett in Houston. The
ash likely won't be dumped in Florida, he said. A disposal facility in Carlyss,
Louisiana, is a possibility.
``From our perspective, it's material that can be handled fairly easily, ''
Plunkett said. ``It's been tested and determined to be non-hazardous, but we
want to handle it in a way that is safe for the environment and that's what we
intend to do.''
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By KARIN MEADOWS
(PROFILE
(WS SL:BC-Carib-US-Globe-Trotting Ash; CT:i;
(REG:CRB;)
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