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The transcription discusses the history and environmental dangers of the Berkeley Pit, an open pit mine in Bewick. It interviews a former miner, a bird affected by the pit, and a local scientist. The pit has filled with toxic water, endangering birds and potentially contaminating drinking water. Efforts have been made to scare birds away and lower the water level, but restoration is slow and expensive. The responsibility for funding restoration falls mostly on taxpayers, while the mining company responsible has not faced consequences. Stronger regulations and accountability for mining pollution are needed. No one could have imagined how the richest hill on earth became a pit full of toxic muck water to kill thousands of birds and endanger the lives of an entire town. When the Andaconda Company began open pit mining in Bewick in the year of 1955, they had no idea of the consequences of the fall. I guess. I'm Dakota, your host here with Salvia, our co-host, and this is an episode of Why You Should Care. We'll also feature an interview with a former miner at the Berkeley Pit, a local bird, and a residential scientist. We'll explain the history of the pit, the environmental dangers, and the challenges it's solving. I'm doing an interview with George, a former miner at the pit. Hello. So you've lived in Bewick since 1948, and worked at the pit from 1966 to the mine's closure in 1982. Yep, don't remind me how old I am. 16 years at that, in a famous mine. What was it like working there? How did you get into the job? I remember life before the pit, even though I was quite young. I think my mother was the happiest in the whole town. She could never stop trying to convince my dad to switch careers. You did get nervous seeing your dad go to the mine, knowing every year a few people don't come back. Open pit mining was hailed as the ultimate safety improvement. I think only a few people died from 55 to closure of the mine. The mine was opened because of the rising copper prices, and we were fairly successful. That's incredible. How did the pit mine work? Why'd it flood? We would excavate the mine in a series of benches, taking all the useful materials. To keep the groundwater out, they were pumped constantly running. They worked well, and there were safeguards in place in case of an emergency. What they didn't protect, however, was the economy of the 70s. With the war, everything was falling fast, especially copper. They stayed for the whole decade, but by the 80s the mine was hemorrhaging money. It closed in 1982. Just one day, we were all sent home, and they put a sign up outside the entrance. Of course, they deactivated the pumps. It actually filled up fairly slowly, but we did begin to notice the water filling the bottom of the pit. No one thought anything of it. It's not like how it is today. From the outside, it was just a puddle, and no one tested it. The company never thought anything of it. I think in the end we excavated over 1.2 billion tons of materials. Bloody incredible. Enough copper to pave a four-lane highway from Butte to Salt Lake City. Pity they didn't end up making it. Well, thanks for taking the time to talk with us today, George. It was great learning about your experience with the now infamous mine. Here's our next interview. Today we're interviewing a bird at the site. Thanks for coming out. Glad to be here. Just stopping off in the middle of my migration. Not many birds come through here. How would you describe your experience with this area? It's not been fun trying to find a good place to stop here. The storms seem to come more each year, and we're almost forced to land here. Not all the birds know what happens, and despite efforts to scare us off sometimes, it isn't enough to stop an emergency landing. It's really annoying when the perfect lake to stop and have a drink is deadly and have to kill most of us within 24 hours. What scares you guys off? They've really tried everything. Initially, they had year-round alarms going off. We called them whalers. If any birds did land, they were shot at. It's pretty terrifying, but these saved our lives rather than ended them. One year, we were all in a massive group when suddenly a storm hit. Most of us had no choice but to land. They did everything they could, but they couldn't stop all of us. I was quite lucky to make it out. I came back the next day, and god, there must have been at least 3,000 birds just floating dead on top of the water. Have they made any changes since? Their new ideas were pretty unsuccessful at first, but it's been better recently. They tried a propane cannon, but it was way too slow to stop us. There were lasers once, but it would have been too risky to make a laser net in case it trapped us underwater. I remember there was even a truck-sized cannon once, shooting winds of 200 mph out of the pit. Then it caught fire. Drones were a good idea, but didn't work during bad weather, which is when most of us land. Now, though, they've started identifying birds. Some died when shot at and should be left alone. They also track the snow geese, who are usually the ones mass dying. They can be prepared when they are coming through. Good to hear that. It has been getting better. Thanks for coming out. Years gone in the last million. Our next is Hank, a local resident and scientist of Duke. Hello, and thanks for having me today. Can you tell us why the pit is so toxic? It's about 1,780 feet deep with over 50 billion gallons of toxic water. This water is about as acidic as lemon juice with a pH of 2.5. It contains many dangerous metals such as copper and sulfuric acid. When the pit began to fill up, the water caused the rock minerals to decay, releasing acid. How are they fixing this? Is the water level still rising? A water treatment plant has opened in 2019 with over, which now treats 10 million gallons of water per day. This is more than enough to stop the rising water level and slowly lowers it each year. It was definitely needed. If it hadn't been built, the water could currently be a critical level just 60 feet away from flowing into groundwater. How dangerous is the water? No human has ever been affected by it, but it's been disastrous to birds. Corpses have been recovered. Autopsies have determined the death to be an infection caused by the metals in the water. The birds inside are lying with burns and festering sores. Not a very pleasant way to go. Are you worried about the pit as a geophysicist? Up until recently, I've been quite worried. Now, thanks to the plant, I can be sure it won't overflow anytime soon. But it's still always a possibility. If they got into our groundwater, it would cause mass ignition and death and complete evacuation. We would have to leave our homes of generations just because of a mine that was improperly managed after it closed in. Who manages restoration? It became an EPA Superfund site in 1987. Some companies involved have donated money to solutions to safety issues with the pit. It's just annoying they had four years to fix this and now it's nearly impossible to solve. They waited until the last second to lower the pit's water level. I think we can manage it, but it'll be a slow process. I just hope companies learn from this and have to take more responsibility in the future. I hope so too, Hank. Thanks for coming out. Your knowledge is very useful. Are we ready? The company behind the pit has never been sued or charged for anything. They aren't affected at all by this environmental issue. Although some have given money to bird safety, the majority of funding comes from the government. The residents of Buitt suffer the most as they are in near-consistent danger that the toxic water may get into their drinking water. Most restoration efforts are funded by taxpayers even though neither of the people of the U.S. or of the government has the issue. In fact, in 2019, the United States Court of Appeals upheld the decision not to protect taxpayers from having to pay for the mine population clean-up. Then the EPA Institute Administrator said he was confident modern regulations would address operation risks and that it would be an undue burden on the mining industry. Freeport-McMoRan, the largest U.S.-based mining company, raked in over $2 billion of profit this past year. I'm sure the average citizen should be the one covering clean-up. We'd hate for them to make $1.9 billion a year. Even when companies do pay, the gap between estimates and real costs is significant. A 2003 report estimated between $1 and $12 billion of mining clean-up liability across the country. And although estimates have gotten more accurate since taxpayers are still made to bridge this gap. Since 1980, there have been over 50 mining spills or pollution releases. Coal mines have to make assurances to pay for pollution clean-up. But hard rock mines are under no such regulations. This is all we have for you guys today. Today we learned of the history of the Berkeley pits, the environmental damage and dangers it poses, the effects on local people and animals, and why this problem is difficult to fix. We hope you now feel knowledgeable about this environmental issue and motivate to push for the registration and stronger regulations on mining pollution. Thank you guys for listening to this week's episode of Why Is She Care? This is Dakota and Dahlia signing off. Peace out. ♪