Geological Disasters

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NATURAL RESOURCE Disasters Choice Board

knox mine disaster

3 mile island

Chernobylnuclear disaster

Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

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THE STORY

effects

pictures

effects

THE STORY

effects

pictures

THE STORY

effects

pictures

THE STORY

Before you evacuate, Answer the Questions in Classkick!

On January 22, 1959, the Knox Mine disaster took place in Port Griffith, Pennsylvania. The Susquehanna River flooded an old coal mine owned by the Knox Coal Company. Twelve miners were killed, and eleven others were trapped for nearly a week before being rescued. The flooding occurred when the river broke through into the mine after miners accidentally broke through to the riverbed while excavating for the River Slope Mine. The company had previously been fined for breaking through to the river on two other occasions but did not take proper precautions to prevent it from happening again. When the flood occurred, many of the miners managed to escape, but some were trapped inside. Rescue efforts began immediately, but progress was slow due to the dangerous conditions. It took six days to reach the trapped miners, who were found alive but suffering from exposure and starvation. The Knox Mine disaster highlighted the dangers of mining and the need for improved safety regulations. It also led to changes in the way mines were operated and monitored to prevent similar accidents in the future.

On 28 March 1979, there was a serious accident at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant in Pennsylvania, USA. The accident happened because of a fault in the system that controls the temperature of the reactor. As a result, the reactor overheated and part of it melted. There was no explosion or fire, but some radioactive gas escaped into the atmosphere. The accident caused panic among local people, who were afraid that they might be exposed to dangerous levels of radiation. About 140,000 people left the area, and many others stayed indoors for several days. In fact, only a small amount of radiation was released, and nobody suffered any ill effects as a result of the accident. However, the accident had a major impact on public opinion. Many people became very concerned about the safety of nuclear power plants, and there was a sharp fall in public support for the nuclear power industry. No new nuclear power plants have been built in the United States since the accident at Three Mile Island.

On April 20, 2010, an explosion occurred on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico. The explosion, which killed 11 men, caused the rig to sink and started a catastrophic oil leak from the well. Before it was capped three months later, approximately 134 million gallons of oil had spilled into the Gulf, the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history. In 2011, one year after the spill, BP agreed to provide up to $1 billion toward early restoration projects in the Gulf of Mexico. On April 4, 2016, the court approved a settlement with BP for natural resource injuries stemming from the spill. This settlement concludes the largest civil settlement ever awarded. We will now begin implementing restoration as laid out in the Trustees’ final comprehensive restoration plan. Under this settlement, BP will pay the Trustees up to $8.8 billion for restoration to address natural resource injuries.

Cleaning up inside the plant after the accident.

THREE MILE ISLAND DISASTER: THE AFTERMATH

• Most people living nearby received an average radiation amount of a chest X-Ray.
• 3 workers were overexposed to radiation
• No adverse health affects

• Conflicting studies on weather cancer cases increased due to disaster
• General consensus is that 3 Mile did not cause increased rates of cancer.
• Main public health concern was stress
• Thousands of air, water, soil, and food samples taken
• Found radiation was well contained to the plant, no major affects on ecosystem

Throwing railroad cars and coal carts into the whirlpool to try to stop water from draining into the mine.

KNOX MINE DISASTER: THE AFTERMATH

• End of anthracite coal mining in Northeast Pennsylvania
• 7,500 jobs lost
• 10 people charged but most charges were dropped
• Mining laws were updated due to the disaster
• Rules about maps and safety plans
• Large rail cars, mine cars, and coal debris were thrown in to plug the hole - pollution
• Water near coal mine has red color due to breakdown of the rock which makes iron oxide.
• Once Knox Coal Company went bankrupt, pumps were turned off which led to flooding.
• Left acidic soil to be treated by government
• Very few plants can grow

DEEPWATER OIL SPILL: THE AFTERMATH

• 11 men died
• 5 million gallons of oil when into the Gulf
• it took 9,700 vessels, 127 aircraft, 47,289 people, 2 million gallons of toxic dispersants, and 89 days to stop the gush of oil
• 40% of Gulf waters were closed to commercial and recreational fishing
• projected to have an $8.7 billion impact on the economy of the Gulf of Mexico
• 3,000 miles of beaches and wetlands along the Gulf Coast were contaminated by oil
• oil spill led to the slow death of deepwater coral within 7 miles of the spill site
• it will take years to know the true effects of the spill

A boat works to collect oil that has leaked from the Deepwater Horizon wellhead in the Gulf of Mexico on April 28, 2010 near New Orleans, Louisiana.

Chernobyl dogs, the descendents of the dogs from the disaster who are being studied for genetic modifications.

CHERNOBYL: THE AFTERMATH

• Exposed millions of people and animals to radiation
• 200,000 people relocated for months after accident
• Pyschological affects deemed worse than physical ones
• 134 first responders diagnosed with Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS)
• 28 died within 4 months
• 19 more over 20 years
• Difficult to track long-term health effects, but no town occupants obtained ARS from the accident.
• Genetically modified animals
• Dogs have increased cataracts
• Most deformed farm animals did not reproduce
• Many animals moved away from disaster site

On April 26, 1986, at 1:23 a.m., reactor number four at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine exploded. It was the worst nuclear accident in history. The explosion happened during a safety test. The test went wrong and there was a sudden power surge. This led to a series of explosions that destroyed the reactor and the building around it. For ten days, radioactive materials were released into the atmosphere. They spread across Europe and as far as the United States. Immediately after the explosion, two workers died from the explosion itself. Another 29 people died in hospital in the following weeks. Some 600,000 workers – known as liquidators – were sent to clean up the site. Many of them received very high doses of radiation. In total, it is estimated that around 4,000 people died as a result of the disaster. The long-term health effects of the radiation are still not clear. There have been many reports of increased rates of cancer and birth defects among those affected by the accident.