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Toxic Slick Contaminates Water Supply Of Chinese City
A Chinese firefighter gives water to a local resident in Harbin, the capital of Heilongjiang province, where officials have cut off the water supply.
(By Jason Lee -- Reuters)
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The Russian city of Khabarovsk, which sits on the border with China, said China's pollution would soon reach its drinking water supply as well. But Chinese officials said it would take at least two weeks for the polluted waters to reach that area.
The Foreign Ministry said it had informed the Russian government of the threat. A spokesman, Liu Jianchao, said the ministry had briefed the Russian Embassy in Beijing twice so far this week.
The Chinese National Petroleum Corp., which owns and operates the Jilin chemical plant, issued an apology to the people of Harbin. The deputy general manager of the giant state-owned enterprise, Zeng Yukang, said his workers would help Harbin officials with emergency drilling for the wells to take the place of normal water supplies.
But several Harbin residents complained to reporters about the way the crisis was handled. The State Environmental Protection Administration acknowledged only Wednesday that the city faced a major pollution threat and identified the chemicals in the water, they noted. In addition, they said, the city cut off water supplies Wednesday morning, then reopened the pipes briefly in the afternoon to allow people to stock up in their bathtubs and plastic containers, only to shut off the flow again during the night before the polluted part of the river streamed by the municipal intake pumps.
But Zhang Lijun, deputy director of the environmental agency, said at a news conference in Beijing that the crisis was handled properly. He said authorities in Jilin immediately notified officials in charge of downstream areas, including Harbin and Heilongjiang province, that the pollution was on the way and that those officials swiftly began planning.
But Harbin residents learned of the danger only as it approached their city. Thousands of them went to the train station and airport to leave Tuesday and Wednesday. Thousands more lined up at stores selling bottled water or drove to relatives' homes in outlying areas where water does not come from the river.
Xue Ye, general secretary of Friends of Nature, a Chinese environmental group, said the government should have protected the river from pollution in the first place by requiring adequate safeguards at the plant in Jilin. The cause of the blast there has not been determined.
Cody reported from Beijing.
