RESIDENTS QUESTION PERCHLORATE CLEANUP.Byline: Kerry Cavanaugh Staff Writer West Hills residents expressed concern Wednesday night that state officials are rushing the decontamination decontamination /de·con·tam·i·na·tion/ (de?kon-tam-i-na´shun) the freeing of a person or object of some contaminating substance, e.g., war gas, radioactive material, etc. de·con·tam·i·na·tion n. of a planned luxury home development downhill from the Santa Susana Santa Susana can refer to several places:
State Department of Toxic Substances Control officials unveiled plans at a public meeting to immediately begin digging up soil with high levels of perchlorate perchlorate: see chlorate. before the rainy season. ``The winter is coming, the storms are coming. We need to do something to prevent the perchlorate from going off the property or going deeper into the ground,'' said Jose Diaz, project manager with DTSC DTSC Department of Toxic Substances Control DTSC DARCOM Technical Steering Committee . Perchlorate is an ingredient in rocket fuel that dissolves easily and moves with water. When found in drinking water drinking water supply of water available to animals for drinking supplied via nipples, in troughs, dams, ponds and larger natural water sources; an insufficient supply leads to dehydration; it can be the source of infection, e.g. leptospirosis, salmonellosis, or of poisoning, e.g. the chemical is linked to thyroid problems and birth defects birth defects, abnormalities in physical or mental structure or function that are present at birth. They range from minor to seriously deforming or life-threatening. A major defect of some type occurs in approximately 3% of all births. . But it does not pose an immediate risk to neighbors in West Hills because the perchlorate is on the surface and groundwater in the area isn't used. Residents were concerned that they still don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. how much perchlorate is on the property. And activists worry that removing the chemical before the investigation is complete could make it difficult to tell whether the perchlorate is linked to rocket-testing contamination at the field lab. ``They're giving people 12 hours to comment on the removal plan. As I read the plan, it looks like a plan to cover up, literally, the perchlorate,'' said Dan Hirsch with the watchdog group Committee to Bridge the Gap. The plan calls for Centex consultant Allwest Remediation to immediately dig up 1,000 cubic yards of tainted soil from Dayton Canyon Creek. In January, Allwest is supposed to complete the full investigation of the perchlorate contamination - including whether the chemical came from the field lab. The 151-home Centex development is located at the corner of Roscoe and Valley Circle boulevards. It's 1.3 miles east of the field lab, where the Boeing Co. conducted rocket-engine tests. In May the Daily News reported that the project was approved by the city in 2001 without requiring soil or water tests, and the original developer sold the site to Centex. Under political and community pressure, Centex tested the soil and found perchlorate up to 62,000 parts per million parts per million mg/kg or ml/l; see ppm. . That's 850 times more potent than perchlorate found at the field lab and nearly 8,000 times the level allowed for a residential development - raising suspicions that the chemical may have been dumped on the site. Kerry Cavanaugh, (818) 713-3746 kerry.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com |
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