Cowabunga Dude! Slimed! Green, 300 sq. mi. blob hits Lake Erie, poisoning water for 400,000
"Cowabunga dude!", as Michelangelo of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles would say.
https://www.facebook.com/teenagemutantninjaturtles
A 300-square-mile blue-green algae slime, the size of New York City, has hit Lake Erie. The slime contains a poisonous bacteria, microcystin, which is known to kill people.
According to CBS News, Fox News, ABC News, NBC News, CNN, and the Associated Press, 400,000 persons are without clean water.
The affected area is between Toledo, Ohio and rural counties southeast of Detroit, Michigan. Points east like Cleveland, Ohio and Erie, Pennsylvania were spared. Bottled water is sold out in stores within a 60 mile radius of Toledo.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/record-breaking-lake-erie-algae-bloom-was-size-of-new-york-city/
Ohio's Governor, John Kasich (pronounced KAY sick) declared an emergency water ban in Toledo. The Ohio National Guard brought in large tanker trucks of water for delivery free to the public.
The scum felt and looked like pea soup, according to Rob Moore, Senior Policy Analyst, Water, of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) an international nonprofit environmental organization with headquarters in New York City.
https://www.nrdc.org/experts/rob-moore/lake-eries-toxic-algae-breaks-records-2015
Boiling the green scum is useless. It only grows the bacteria, microcystin, and fails to get rid of it. To get rid of the bacteria, it has to be chemically treated with potassium permanganate, powdered activated carbon, chlorine, and other chemicals.
This story broke on August 2, 2014. The "Do Not Drink the Water Ban" in Toledo was lifted three days later.
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