UK firm suspected in chemical leak
Date: 06-Mar-02
Country: ITALY
Author: David Brough
Some 200 tonnes of chromated copper arsenate are leaking at the port because they had been packed into unsuitable containers, said Alemayehu Wodageneh, a senior chemicals expert at the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
"Guard dogs at the site have died, and some people are feeling very sick," Wodageneh told Reuters this week.
"The chemical is highly toxic to marine life," he added. "When it rains soon, the chemical could flow into the sea and have a very serious impact on fish stocks. This chemical is extremely dangerous to people."
Chromated copper arsenate is primarily used as a wood preservative for power and telegraph poles. The chemical is dangerous to the environment, according to the Rome-based FAO.
HEALTH WORRIES
Kevin Helps, a FAO chemicals expert who visited the site at Djibouti port on the Gulf of Aden, said incorrect handling of the chemical by workers unfamiliar with safety procedures had exposed many to unacceptable levels of the toxic material.
The present location of the containers is already severely contaminated and is within 400 metres of a food aid storage site, Wodageneh said.
More than 200 tonnes of the chemical were shipped recently from Britain to be delivered to the Ethiopian Power Corporation, FAO officials said.
The chemicals were packaged in plastic containers.
"All previous shipments of this chemical have used steel drums for the product and no leakage occurred," Helps said.
"It appears that the plastic containers have suffered a catastrophic failure resulting in leakage from the container," he said. "The containers must have started to leak while on the vessel."
Wodageneh said that the initial leakage discovered last month came from 10 shipping containers, but a further five containers had since been found at the port, some of which were leaking.
"Whoever is responsible should clean it up, repackage it and send it back where it came from," Wodageneh said.
"The Djibouti government is determined to send it back."
Djibouti government officials were not immediately available for comment.
The company in Britain believed responsible for supplying the chemical did not return a phone call.