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By KASIA KOPEC kkopec@leader.net
Sunday, December 07, 2003 Page: 1B
The high-tech, super-powerful pumps were supposed to save the anthracite
industry, but instead they choked a mighty river and threatened thousands of
people who drank its water.
It was Oct. 2, 1961, and deep mining in Northeastern Pennsylvania was
floundering when the Glen Alden Coal Co. of Ashley flipped the switch to start
its three new deep-mine water pumps.
The pumps, which Glen Alden planned to use to remove water from its South
Wilkes-Barre mine, cost just under $1 million to build and install. The state
and federal government shared the expense as part of a program aimed at
restarting anthracite operations locally.
Two years earlier, the Knox Mine disaster had all but ended local mining
operations when 12 people died after the mine in which they were working was
flooded.
The disaster brought a new urgency to dewatering. In its aftermath, a total
of 10 pumping stations, with 27 pumps, had begun operating under the state and
federal dewatering program. The government paid for the pumps, with mining
companies, such as Glen Alden, responsible only for operation and maintenance
costs.
But 48 hours after the Glen Alden pumps were started, 55 miles of the
Susquehanna River, from Wilkes-Barre to Sunbury, had been polluted with
acid-mine water, causing an estimated 300,000 dead fish to wash up on the
river’s banks.
The fish kill was the river’s largest ever and the second biggest in state
history.
“It was like tile on a floor, you couldn’t walk near the river without
stepping on dead fish,” recalls Deborah Beck, whose father Basse Beck
frequently wrote about the pollution in his Sunbury Daily Item column “Up and
Down the River.”
Fish Commission Secretary Albert Day was among those charged with
investigating the incident, which he described as devastating.
“This is one of the more serious pollution problems we have ever faced,”
said Day on Oct. 18, 1961, less than a week after the pumping began. “A kill
of this nature is so serious that it will take two or three years to recover
from it.”
Of even greater concern was the impact the discharge would have on people.
Among the most pressing worries was finding safe alternatives for those who
relied on the river for drinking water downstream from Wyoming Valley.
Manufacturers that used river water, including the pharmaceutical giant, Merck
and Co., in Danville, were forced to halt or scale back production.
In the weeks that followed, Luzerne County municipalities and others
downstream also began to question the logic of spending millions of dollars to
install sewage treatment systems, only to have the river those systems were
meant to protect polluted by coal companies, who were exempt under the state’s
Clean Streams Law.
Meanwhile, Glen Alden officials denied any wrongdoing and said the state
Department of Health was harassing the company by insisting it treat mine
water discharge before releasing it into the river. In a December letter to
then Gov. David Lawrence, the company pleaded its case:
“Now, and some say inappropriately in the name of fish salvation, the
state is jeopardizing human economic salvation.”
The argument was not without teeth.
In 1961, Glen Alden remained the largest employer in Luzerne County with a
payroll of $12 million and a contract to supply 485,000 tons of coal to the
Department of Defense.
This mutual dependence fostered a culture in which lawmakers were hesitant,
if not downright opposed, to imposing environmental regulations that made
mining coal more time consuming and more expensive.
“Up until 1966, coal companies had been basically exempt from the state’s
Clean Streams Act,” said Franklin Kury, of Sunbury, who ran for the
Legislature after his state representative voted against a bill that would
have added coal companies to the list of those regulated by the law.
Kury, along with Basse Beck, who served as his campaign manager, waged a
public relations battle aimed at changing attitudes.
While Beck wrote prolifically about the Glen Alden mine discharge and its
aftermath, Kury campaigned on a clean streams platform.
The message resonated with voters and Kury was elected to the state House
in 1966.
“People were very upset about what had happened, especially in Sunbury,
where just about everyone is connected to the river in one way or another,”
said Kury.
In response to the outcry from his constituents, Kury re-introduced the
bill amending the Clean Streams Act to include coal companies, and this time
it had enough votes to pass. And a few years later, Kury authored the state’s
Environmental Bill of Rights, guaranteeing residents the right to clean air
and water.
The landmark legislation made it impossible for Glen Alden and other coal
companies to continue operating their pumps without treating mine water before
discharging it into state watersheds, a process executives balked at because
of the cost.
As a result, the already struggling industry fizzled out amid a flurry of
court battles launched in an effort to overturn the new regulations.
Kury, who now works as a Harrisburg attorney specializing in environmental
law, said the changes make the state a better place for everyone.
“We weren’t in it for the fish, or to bring down the coal companies,”
said Kury. “We just figured if the fish couldn’t survive in these waters,
they couldn’t be very healthy for the rest of us.”
Kasia Kopec, a Times Leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7436.
TIMES LEADER FILE PHOTOS
Glen Alden Coal Co. employees prepare to fire up deep-mine water pumps in
October 1961. The pumps, which were capable of removing 26 million gallons of
water a day from the South Wilkes-Barre mine, were supposed to help save the
anthracite industry. But instead they were blamed for one of the worst
environmental disasters in the state’s history.
Acid mine water from the Glen Alden Coal Co.’s South Wilkes-Barre colliery
is pumped into Solomon’s Creek en route to the Susquehanna River. The polluted
water caused an estimated 300,000 fish to die and caused great concern for
communities downriver who depended on the Susquehanna for drinking water.