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Colorado Town Fears Avalanche of Water
More than 1 billion gallons of contaminated water — enough to fill 1,500 Olympic-sized swimming pools — is trapped in a tunnel in the mountains above the historic town of Leadville and threatening to blow.
Lake County Commissioners have declared a local state of emergency for fear that this winter's above-average snowpack will melt and cause a catastrophic tidal wave.
The water is backed up in abandoned mine shafts and a 2.1-mile drainage tunnel that is partially collapsed, creating the pooling of water contaminated with heavy metals.
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Leadville Residents Prepare For Disaster
The sound of deafening warning sirens went off at 5:30 p.m. Friday evening in the town of Leadville.
Federal officials made sure residents of the Village of East Fork were aware of the test as there is increasing concern a nearby mine drainage tunnel will burst. If that happens, officials said a billion gallons of toxic water would flood the community and countless others downstream.
Some said the alarm, accompanied with the message "seek higher ground and use escape roads" were sufficient. Others said it wasn't enough.
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Quit stalling
THE LAKE County commissioners are angry and frustrated, and we don’t blame them.
They have been deeply concerned for at least four years about the Leadville Mine Drainage Tunnel, which has been plugged by cave-ins. Behind that precarious plug is an estimated 1 billion gallons of water laced with acids and heavy metals.
The commissioners and area mining engineers fear that the plug could blow out at any moment, sending all that built-up polluted water gushing out of the tunnel. That could cause deadly peril to the 400 people who live in a nearby mobile home park and could cause environmental damage on the Arkansas River for years.
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