Mining Watch Comes to Mitchell Bay on Quesnel Lake
Ugo Lapointe from Mining Watch Canada got to experience his office from this very special piece of BC wilderness!
Wilderness that is being taken for granted by the BC Government and Mount Polley Mining Corp!
The thought of mining effluent of any composite into this “pristine lake”
"Pristine: In its original condition; unspoiled. Clean and fresh as if new; spotless.
synonyms: immaculate, perfect, in mint condition, as new, unspoiled, spotless, flawless, impeccable, clean, fresh, new, virgin, pure, unused"
injures the soul, hurts the heart, Government is not listening and Industry doesn’t care.
It was wonderful and at times overwhelming to listen to Ugo Lapointe talk about the mining issues, not just in Quesnel Lake but across the country. Issues like huge tracks of land that are destroyed in gold mining to garner enough gold the size of 2 smart cars. That gold is predominately used for jewelry, not much else. The Ajax Mine tailings pond which will be within 2.5 km of the City of Kamloops, is many times larger in size than the pond that failed and released into Quesnel Lake.
I fear what will happen to Quesnel Lake over time! We don’t have independent testing of Quesnel Lake so residents aren’t confident in the water and fish being safe. That there is no actual science that tells us that the modeling used (TAR) to decide if this lake can survive the tailings from the failed dam and ongoing effluent discharge! There’s absolutely no government research being done on the 25,000 m3 of tailings in the lake and the long term affects.
Government and the Mine don’t want to hear about the changes to the Lake since the accident. The Mine actually squanders funds on research to tell the residents that what we are seeing is actually a figment of our imagination! Or that an unaffected creek emptying into Quesnel Lake is not as “clean” as the effluent the mine is discharging into the lake.
Will Quesnel Lake survive this onslaught from Industry? A computer model says it will, the Mine says they are not polluting the lake, the government agrees with the Mine.
If a computer model tells the Mine that the lake will survive, where was the Mine’s computer modeling before the failure! Why should we believe them now!
It is understood that Quesnel Lake has lost the term “pristine” not just for today or this month but forever.
