Obama
administration officials called the Gold King Mine disaster in Colorado
an “accident,” but an analysis from The Daily Caller News Foundation of
government documents and public statements makes clear the disaster was
anything but accidental.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) intentionally opened up the
abandoned mine, which unleashed 3 million gallons of toxic waste into
nearby rivers that residents of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and the
Navajo Nation depend upon for drinking water.
Agency administrator Gina McCarthy even called the mine spill an “
unfortunate accident” in an Aug. 11, 2015, speech on the matter, but EPA officials have since been more cautious in describing the event.
McCarthy, for example, avoided labeling the spill an “accident”
in her prepared testimony before House lawmakers
in September, instead calling the spill an “unfortunate incident.” EPA
spokesmen have also steered clear of calling Gold King Mine an accident.
“As Administrator McCarthy has said, ‘This was a tragic and
unfortunate incident, and EPA has taken responsibility to ensure that it
is cleaned up appropriately,’” an agency spokeswoman told TheDCNF.
EPA’s internal report avoided using the term “accident” and called the mine blowout an “incident.” And another top agency official testifying before lawmakers in September
echoed McCarthy’s refrain that the spill was an “unfortunate incident.”
“Information the agency has received to date from both external and
internal reviews of the matter has revealed no evidence that the blowout
was in any way intentional,” the spokeswoman said.
New evidence tells a different story. A newly released email between
Obama administration officials following the August disaster shows EPA
workers intentionally breached Gold King Mine.
“There was nothing unintentional about EPA’s actions with regard to
breaching the mine,” Utah Republican Rep. Rob Bishop told Department of
the Interior (DOI) Secretary Sally Jewell during a hearing in early
March. “They fully intended to dig out the plug and breach it.”
Bishop’s statement stems from a recently publicized email between
Interior Department officials. Brent Lewis, who heads the Bureau of Land
Management’s abandoned mine program, wrote to colleagues that he had
spoken to EPA’s project manager and got the following information:
“On 8/5/2015, the EPA was attempting to relieve hydrologic pressure
behind a naturally collapsed adit/portal of the Gold King Mine,” reads
an attachment to Lewis’ Aug. 7 email, obtained by investigators for the
House Committee on Natural Resources.
“The EPA’s plan was to slowly drain and treat enough mine water in
order to access the inner mine working and assess options for
controlling its discharge,” reads the attachment. “While removing small
portions of the natural plug, the material catastrophically gave-way and
released the mine water.”
Lewis’ email directly contradicts Jewell’s testimony that the spill was an accident. Most recently,
Jewell maintained the spill was an “accident” when
Bishop confronted him with Lewis’ email. Jewell stuck to the story she
gave Bishop and his committee when she first called the spill an “
accident.”
While the EPA intentionally breached Gold King Mine, it’s likely they
did not believe their actions would set loose 3 million gallons of
toxic mine wastewater. Had the agency tested the mine for pressure and
not dug directly into its entrance, the blowout might not have occurred.
Yellow mine waste water is seen at the entrance to the Gold King Mine in
San Juan County, Colorado, in this picture released by the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) taken August 5, 2015.
REUTERS/EPA/Handout
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