Coal slurry spill threatens Belmont County creek

Oct 1 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Doug Caruso The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

Water contaminated with coal dust has spilled for the fourth time since 2000 into a Belmont County creek that is home to an endangered salamander, state agencies reported this morning.

The coal slurry, water used to wash newly mined coal, spilled from a pipeline that runs from Murray Energy's American Century Mine across Captina Creek to the company's Ohio Valley coal slurry impoundment, said Mike Shelton, a spokesman for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

The break occurred in a joint in the pipeline about 250 feet north of the creek in a hayfield, Shelton said, spilling slurry into the field and the creek.

The company issued a brief statement this afternoon saying that it is cooperating with state officials on the cleanup.

Murray Energy stopped pumping slurry, erected dikes to keep additional slurry out of the creek and is vacuuming up the spilled slurry, Shelton said.

"Our staff is still out on site and we're walking the rest of the pipeline to make sure the pipeline is stable," Shelton said.

Ohio Environmental Protection Agency crews also are on their way to the scene, said Erin Strouse, an agency spokeswoman. Murray called the EPA's spill hotline to report the leak around 7:30 a.m., she said.

The spill apparently is smaller than one in February 2008 that sent coal slurry as far as the Ohio River, Strouse said, but EPA crews will determine just how bad this spill is.

Coal slurry has spilled into Captina Creek in 2000, 2005 and in 2008.

Captina Creek is home to the endangered eastern hellbender salamander.

Murray paid a $50,000 fine for the 2005 spill, which polluted 2,300 feet of the stream and killed thousands of fish. Murray Energy is applying to build a new coal slurry lagoon in the area, but so far none of its plans has met with approval from the Ohio EPA or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

This spill should serve as a warning against allowing more slurry lagoons, said Jack Shaner, deputy director of the Ohio Environmental Council.

"If the state of Ohio ever needed a reason to not allow another impoundment of coal waste, this is it," he said.

Murray Energy officials did not immediate respond to a request for comment.