News from Canada:
Truro council wants to halt cyanide transfer
JASON MALLOY
The Truro Daily News
February 5, 2008
TRURO – Town councillors are rip-roaring mad a mine operator didn’t inform them of a plan to transfer a dangerous chemical in Truro.
Councillors instructed its solicitor to seek an immediate injunction until it can hear from proponents. DDV Gold Limited’s plan is to use the cyanide in a gold mining operation in Moose River, Halifax County.
The hazardous material will be shipped to Truro by train before being trucked along Highways 102 and 224 to Moose River.
“I think we should all be outraged that all these decisions would be made without informing us first,” Coun. Raymond Tynes said Monday at town council’s February meeting.
“They can’t consult us than they can expect nothing from me but grief at every step, every turn.”
Councillors found out about the proposal in a letter to the editor in the Truro Daily News in January.
“It’s always suspicious to me when you’re kept in the dark until the last minute and the company doing the study also has a stake in it,” said Coun. Diane Bennett-Cook. “It doesn’t smell right.”
The Department of Environment and Labour approved the operation with a number of conditions on Friday. The government said the mine is expected to operate for seven years. “I want to know before these shipments come what are the ramifications,” said Coun. Charles Cox.
Mayor Bill Mills has been told where the cyanide will be transferred in the Truro Industrial Park but he would not disclose the exact location for safety reasons. He has spoken with Truro-Bible Hill MLA Jamie Muir as well as officials from CN and DDV.
“The transportation risk assessment offers the opinion that the shipments can be managed safely and securely without incident,” Muir wrote in a letter to the town.
Mills said the official from DDV suggested a one-day seminar with local emergency officials to speak about a response if a spill occurs. No date has been set. Bennett-Cook said she wanted to see an independent, consultative investigation to determine the risks.
jmalloy@trurodaily.com
Deadly cyanide along Route 224
FRANK CASSIDY
The Truro Daily News
February 9, 2008
The process was so seamless, so unpublicized, one would almost think the matter under consideration by the Department of Transportation and Environment involved rail cars laden with orange juice.
We could only wish.
The public in general, and Truro town council in particular, were stunned when the story leaked out.
An Australian mining company had applied to the Nova Scotia government for a licence to operate an open pit gold mine in Moose River. And while the thoughts of scarring acreage in the eastern part of the province for a century or so is repulsive enough, the company plans to ship deadly cyanide by rail to Truro, where it would be transferred to trucks and shipped along Highways 102 and 224 to the mine site.
Let there be no mistake. Cyanide is a hydrocyanic acid salt product, highly poisonous and deadly to living creatures. Exposure to cyanide does not involve a swift trip to the hospital outpatients department for remedial treatment.
With a site at the Truro Industrial Park, and a planned transfer point from rail to truck, town council has reacted swiftly to investigate the feasibility of an injunction, halting shipment of cyanide through the community – and with good reason.
A spill would have devastating effects.
While, as South Colchester-Musquodoboit MLA Brooke Taylor points out, hazardous chemicals such as gas and propane are transported all over the province, tankers full of cyanide are another consideration all together.
The honourable cabinet minister and member of the legislature is unconcerned that trucks carrying cyanide will pass directly in front of his house.
And one has to question a letter sent to council by Truro-Bible Hill MLA Jamie Muir saying: “The transportation risk assessment offers the opinion that the shipments can be managed safely and securely without incident.”
I wonder how confident that honourable cabinet minister and member of the legislature would be if chemical-laden 16-wheelers drove by his Smith Avenue home at regular intervals.
Are the soothing words from our MLAs based on the strict standards set down by the Department of Environment? One would hope not. Environment Minister Mark Parent openly admits there are flaws in regulations but his department is reviewing them. (Would, then, the new rules apply retroactively? Laugh here.)
I’m mystified why the Nova Scotia government sees fit to approve an open-face gold mine operation in Moose River, where the land will, in polite terms, be raped and ravaged, with cyanide quite likely leaching into the water table. At the same time, an American gravel company will not be permitted to establish a rock quarry operation on Digby Neck because the proposal is considered environmentally unacceptable.
The provincial government has jumped into this deal. Quite frankly, I find the commentary and soothing reaction of local MLAs to be worrisome.
Who was the bright light in the Department of Environment who overlooked the potential for disaster in the centre of Truro if a rail accident were to occur?
Why was it that the town only found out about this plan to ship cyanide through the community when councillors read about it in the Truro Daily News?
Why is the transfer point from rail car to truck in the Truro Industrial Park being kept such a secret?
For security purposes?
What a hoot.
Has anybody thought about tanker truck drivers wending their ways along the twisty, winding, narrow route that is Highway 224? What of the 16-wheelers crossing the one-lane bridge spanning the pristine Musquodoboit River near the Moose River Road?
This is a calamity waiting to happen.
Frank Cassidy is the newsroom manager of the Truro Daily News. He can be reached anytime at
fcassidy@trurodaily.com.