Cleanup crews dig deep
Workers use heavy equiptment to clean a heating oil spill at the intersection of First and Fourth Avenues.
POLSON — Officials say that on March 20 a fuel spill was detected on the future site of the Tribal Health Complex at the intersection of Fourth Avenue and First Street in Polson. The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Natural Resources Department Division of Environmental Protection was notified of the leakage on March 23, and cleanup efforts are now winding down.
Officials from CSKT and the federal Environmental Protection Agency are working on the cleanup.
Tillman McAdams, of the EPA, has been closely involved with the issue since its onset. He said red dye diesel leaked from a 400-gallon heating oil tank. A second “farm tank” that held 660 gallons of “questionable contents” was also discovered to have contributed to the contaminants, McAdams said.
An estimated 200 gallons of heating oil was spilled in the location, according to Rich Janssen, divisional manager of the CSKT NRDDEP.
More than 500 cubic yards of contaminated soil is begin removed from the location. A hole of about 18-feet deep marks the cleanup efforts, leaving a large dent in the ground where the new clinic will stand. A portion of the sidewalk around the 300 block of First Street East is closed due to the work.
As the site was home to an old gas station, the heating oil tank leakage was an inconvenience in the amount of about $300,000, Janssen said.
Janssen said a local concrete agency may recycle the contaminated soil by transforming it into asphalt.
An additional soil test is expected to be ready sometime this week. McAdams said the test will further define any additional contaminants in the soil, such as lead and Methyl tert-butyl ether.
“The human health threat goes way down when those measures are taken,” McAdams said.
Janssen said ground-water-monitoring wells and soil vapor extraction methadology will be installed at the site to maintain soil clarity.
A CSKT press release estimated the spilled fuel will create a 4-week delay in the clinic’s construction.
“As has been the case for the past several decades, the Salish and Kootenai Tribes are cleaning up previous environmental conditions to make the community better for everyone who lives here,” CSKT chairman James Steele Jr. said.
Previous projections had estimated the building would be completed by December, the release said.