Almost 20,000 gallons of pesticide gushed from an overturned railroad tank car into the Sacramento River, killing thousands of fish and forcing hundreds of people to flee.
As the chemical drifted downstream Monday toward Lake Shasta, California health authorities said there did not appear to be an immediate threat to drinking water and it was too soon to determine whether the chemical would poison fish in the lake.
The chemical was identified by the railroad as Alco metam sodium, a liquid weed and tree-stump killer that is not considered fatal to human beings but is deadly to aquatic life.
State Assemblyman Stan Statham, who surveyed the area from the air, described it as ”probably one of the worst ecological river spills ever on record in our north state (area).”
Ryan Broddrick, deputy chief enforcement officer for the state Department of Fish and Game, said, ”This is one of the finest fly fishing places in the state. We expect it will kill all of the fish or the majority of the fish in the stream below Dunsmuir,” about 200 miles north of Sacramento.
John Reginato, acting general manager of the Shasta-Cascade Wonderland Association, a trade association, said, ”People who live on the river tell me the fish kill has been astronomical. The river is deathly quiet-no songbirds calling, no eagles screaming.”
A 50-mile section of Interstate 5 from Mountain Gate to Mt. Shasta was closed to keep out sightseers. Passengers on Amtrak`s Coast Starlight were put on buses.
Authorities asked residents along the river to voluntarily leave their homes, and a shelter for displaced residents was opened at Dunsmuir High School.
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At least four people were overcome by the fumes created when the chemical mixed with water. Firefighters and sheriff`s deputies roamed the riverbank warning fishermen and campers to leave.
Because the chemical is a weed killer, environmental experts fear that a swath of vegetation from the area of the spill to Lake Shasta will perish. However, because of the foul smell, animals and birds usually will stay away. Approximately 19,500 gallons of the plant poison spilled into the river after the railroad tank car jumped the tracks at a bridge around Sunday evening and landed upside down in the water, said Bob Houghtby, spokesman for the California Department of Fish and Game in Redding.
It was too soon to determine whether the toxic chemical would damage the fish in Lake Shasta, Houghtby said.