Current Events Scrapbook

Poisonous mud wreaks havoc on Java

Something else has gone horribly wrong in Indonesia. The island country has certainly been taking a beating from the environment, the Earth itself, lately.

• the infamous tsunami at the end of December 2004
• H5N1 wiped out the blood-related members of a family following infection of one of their members in 2006, shortly before the volcano erupted
• the volcano erupted sending searing gasses rolling down the mountainside, killing those farmers that were too slow to evacuate

And now, toxic mud steeped in hydrogen sulfide is pouring up from deep in the earth.

Apparently, a drilling company seeking to find a pocket of natural gas under the earth found some. However, it was not the gas they were looking for that they got. Plus, a lot of mud has come up with it - adding significant mass to the high volume problem they have inadvertently tapped into.

The article below says the community is getting at least 500 cubic meters of toxic mud every day from the drill sight. It says 8,000 people have been displaced - and 12 square kilometers of land has been covered, devastating 4 villages in the area.

ABC Finance News:

Poisonous mud and gas is erupting from kilometres below the earth and 8,000 people are displaced and hundreds hospitalised on the Indonesian island of Java.
The calamity has been caused by a gas exploration project near Surabaya in East Java that has gone horribly wrong, and for the past six weeks, has unleashed hundreds of tonnes of hot toxic mud.

Talk about your basic energy exploration project gone bad.

Environmentalists say the searing mud is a toxic brew of harmful chemicals churned up with dangerous gases.

Indonesian Environment Forum spokesman Torry Kuswardono says it can cause infection to the respiratory systems.

There are two things: first, it's the mud and second, it's the gas, the hydrogen sulphide he said.

Something that hopefully would have been a financial boon for people in the area, the country, and foreign investors is now looking like a boondoggle of the first order of magnitude.

The rice paddies have been buried in toxic mud, the factories have several feet of the mud around them, and the villages are filled with the mud too.

The number of refuges after this series of geological and chemical disasters must be staggering.

Add to that mix the incipient threat of a infectious human borne strain of H5N1 that could be starting to materialize there, and the prospects of life in Indonesia are getting very gloomy.

Geologically, chemically, and perhaps biologically, Indonesia seems to be skating on very thin ice.

posted by John Collins @ 10:24 AM