Frustration is mounting for many of the 300,000 West Virginia residents who have gone without clean tap water since a chemical spill on Thursday. Business owners with empty dining rooms and quiet aisles of merchandise around West Virginia's capital city were left to wonder how much of an economic hit they will take from the spill.
Most visitors have cleared out of Charleston while locals are either staying home or driving out of the area to find somewhere they can get a hot meal or a shower. Orders not to use tap water for much other than flushing toilets mean that the spill is an emergency not just for the environment but also for local businesses.
The emergency began on Thursday, following complaints to West Virginia American Water about a licorice-type odour in the tap water. The source: the chemical 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, which had leaked out of a 40,000-gallon (151,400-litre) tank at a Freedom Industries facility along the Elk River.
State officials said on Saturday they believe about 7,500 gallons leaked. Some of the chemical was contained before flowing into the river; it is not clear exactly how much entered the water supply.
I don't think it's a hippie thing. Lot's of media concentrated in NY. Bridge story either directly affects them or people they know. A media thing, not a hippie thing.
Is it actually news when people in WV don't have clean drinking water?
"The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all."
Ah, my town. It's been crazy here the past five days. An end in sight is forthcoming though. I honestly had no clue about the bridge issue. Sorta been head down trying to sort out how to keep working and training while all is shut down and a shower is in short order. Thank god for an elaborate home gym, wifi and an abundance of camping supplies (and that is not a shape reference).
Don't know how important water is until you can't use it.
The cool thing about training is that becoming more sexy is just a side effect........
seeahill wrote:I don't think it's a hippie thing. Lot's of media concentrated in NY. Bridge story either directly affects them or people they know. A media thing, not a hippie thing.
Environmental stories don't get a lot of press outside of the city/region/country they impact.
Anything that happens in NY is a story, especially compared to something that happens in West Virginia.
WildGorillaMan wrote:Enthusiasm combined with no skill whatsoever can sometimes carry the day.
seeahill wrote:I don't think it's a hippie thing. Lot's of media concentrated in NY. Bridge story either directly affects them or people they know. A media thing, not a hippie thing.
Moderate inconvenience for them > environmental disaster affecting someone else then? What would Gaia think?
"Liberalism is arbitrarily selective in its choice of whose dignity to champion." Adrian Vermeule
