EXCLUSIVE: 'Worse Than Feared' Poison In WV Leak, Radiation Concern

Note: Comments regarding radioactive material in this article do not relate to work of microbiologist Yuri Gorby, but concern some people in the impacted disaster zone. In a follow-up message about this matter Sunday, Jan. 26, Dr Gorby stated: “I want to make only 1 point: we don’t know the complete complement of chemicals that might be present in that spill.  To my knowledge there is no reason or effort to test for the presence of radioactive materials.” While the author did not state Dr. Gorby thinks radioactivity is an issue in the West Virginia disaster zone, the author apologizes to Dr. Gorby and readers for ill-effect about this possible confusion. 

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An independent scientist is working to identify other hazardous chemicals that leaked into West Virginia water, namely fracking chemicals. This has been described as the “worst fear imagined”, according to a local state political figure’s statements to Before It’s News’ Deborah Dupré in an exclusive interview conducted Tuesday and Wednesday.

In the race to identify the exact chemical that corporate bodies and government had not publically identified, microbiologist Yuri Gorby has won, again.

Gorby stated that another secret chemical leaked and was the cause of the surge in ER visits the day that the government water ban lifted, as Before It’s News reported Friday in the article, Scientists Blow Lid Off Why ERs SURGING As WV Water Ban Lifts.

Four days later, on Tuesday, Freedom Industries, the company responsible for the poisoning of hundreds of thousands of people, admitted another chemical was in its tank that leaked. 

Gary Southern, president of Freedom Industries, told West Virginia environmental regulator Mike Dorsey about the presence of the second chemical around 10 a.m. Tuesday, according to the Charleston Gazette newspaper. 

Tuesday night, it was confirmed to Before It’s News that a second chemical, might be in the mix, according to a political figure affiliated with the Green Party. 

Repeatedly, the public was told that the leaked chemical was a 4-methylcyclohexane methanol (“Crude MCHM) used in the froth flotation process to wash and prepare coal. 

“There had been a lot of activity at Freedom Industries site just before the leak was announced”, said Green Party affiliate Mountain Party leader, Jesse Johnson, who lives just upstream from the leak on the Elk River.

“The tank that leaked had been used a lot more than usual,” Johnson said. “An unusually high number of fracking trucks were going in and coming out of Freedom’s facility using that tank just before this happened.”

Johnson, 54, has been an Executive Committee member and former Chair and Vice Chair of the Mountain Party, West Virginia’s affiliate of the Green Party of the United States. He’s been his party’s nominee for Governor of West Virginia three times and twice nominated for West Virginia’s Class 1 U.S. Senate seat.

Johnson helped lead a group of scientists around the chemically impacted area soon after the leak was announced. Afterwards, he was very ill, “staggering for two days” after accompanying a research team from Univeristy of South Alabama to poisoned homes.  

Behind him, he said, he left a path of people with rashes and neurological problems.  

“I know a number of people having health problems, including me,” Johnson told Dupré Tuesday. “I’ve had burning eyes and sinuses since the leak. I first chalked it up to seasonal flu.”

“The chemicals that leaked were not produced in West Virginia,” he said. “People are having nosebleeds.”

Radiation Poisoning?

Nosebleeds are among the top 10 signs of radioactive poisoning, a major health hazard to people in fracked areas. Small traces of radioactivity can prove deadly and even a small amount of radioactive material can have a devastating impact on humans unfortunate enough to come into direct contact with it, according to environmental attorney Stuart Smith. It has been one of the poisons impacting people along the Gulf Coast after the BP-wrecked Macondo oil well event in 2010. (See: Vampire Of Macondo)

Freedom Industries is remaining tight-lipped about what was actually in the tank, accept to admit something else was in it besides what it initially told the public. 

“It was Freedom’s responsibility to let people know there was another chemical in the tank and they did not,” said Amy Goodwin, director of communications for Gov. Tomblin. ”At this point there is very limited trust in any of the information that is being provided by Freedom.”

Goodwin said that the second they found out about the second chemical, the Department of Environmental Protection, the Department of Health and Human Resources, the National Guard, and the Office of Homeland Security went out and did testing within the system.

The United States military’s Weapons of Mass Destruction response teams are also on the scene.

Freedom Industries’ Gary Southern, admits that the second chemical in the tank was a “stripped form” of PPH, meaning it has certain elements removed from its pure form.

Although toxicologic information on PPH is limited, the CDC claims it appears to have a lower toxicity level than MCHM. 

American Water, the parent company of West Virginia American Water, the private company responsible for the region’s water supply, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that it was conducting tests.

“We have described in detail our water treatment process with state chemical experts, who ascertained that our current treatment process would likely have removed this chemical. We are also testing water samples collected last week to further confirm this and will share those results when available,” water company spokeswoman Maureen Duffy told Al Jazeera. 

After consulting with other authorities in the wake of the revelation of the second chemical’s presence, American Water said it determined that the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources was “best positioned to discuss health-related questions about this chemical.” 

He will not be testing for radiation today as planned. He’s too ill.

Johnson told Dupré in a hoarse voice on the phone Wednesday morning that he thought it would be days before he’s well enough to go out.

“It feels like the flu,” he said. 

Correction: Dr. Yuri Gorby is a microbiologist, not an organic chemist as this article originally stated. Dr. Gorby thinks at this point, on Jan. 22, that the radiation threat is minimal or non-existent. Also, to clarify, Dr. Gorby “has not directly associated the chemical mixture that was released into the Elk River with fracking.”

Correction; This article originally stated that a grant was awarded to Occupy The Hollers to purchase a Geiger counter That grant was awarded to a private citizen for the Geiger counter.

Additional Sources: Al Jazeera, Before It’s News

Photo Credits: Occupy The Hollers, Richard Denison, Jennifer McPartland

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