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nitpicker

(7,153 posts)
Mon Apr 23, 2018, 04:53 AM Apr 2018

Environment prize goes to Flint water activist

Source: BBC

Environment prize goes to Flint water activist
1 hour ago

The founder of a citizens' movement that helped expose the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, is one of the recipients of the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize. Nearly 100,000 residents of Flint were left without safe tap water after lead began leaching into the supply.

Mother of four LeeAnne Walters led a citizens' movement that tested the tap water to expose the health threat. Tests showed lead levels in her water were seven times the acceptable limit.

In 2014, the water in Ms Walters' home turned brownish and she noticed rashes on her three-year-old twins. Her daughters' hair then fell out in clumps. Walters spent months reading technical documents about the Flint water system. She then teamed up with environmental engineer Dr Marc Edwards, from Virginia Tech, who helped her conduct extensive water testing in the city. She methodically sampled each zip code in Flint and set up a system to ensure the integrity of the tests, working over 100 hours per week for three weeks. They showed lead levels as high as 13,200 parts per billion in some parts of the city - more than twice the level classified as hazardous waste by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The contamination was traced to the city switching its water supply away from Detroit's system, which draws from Lake Huron, and beginning instead to draw water from the Flint River.
(snip)

Read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-438402

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Environment prize goes to Flint water activist (Original Post) nitpicker Apr 2018 OP
K&R - But link doesn't work: Rhiannon12866 Apr 2018 #1
This message was self-deleted by its author LovingA2andMI Apr 2018 #2
Reminds me of the Love Canal woman. llmart Apr 2018 #3

Response to nitpicker (Original post)

llmart

(15,501 posts)
3. Reminds me of the Love Canal woman.
Mon Apr 23, 2018, 08:50 AM
Apr 2018

Can't remember her name right now, but it was a woman who persevered in that disaster who put Love Canal in the spotlight.

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