One of the most notorious sites, Love Canal, was a dry canal bed owned by Hooker and located just east of its Niagara Falls plant. Amongst the chemicals that were buried in the Love Canal are twelve known carcinogens, including benzene and dioxin Dioxins and dioxin-like compounds (DLCs) are compounds that are highly toxic environmental persistent organic pollutants (POPs). They are mostly by-products of various industrial processes-or, in case of dioxin-like PCBs and PBBs, part of intentionally produced mixtures.Dioxins and dioxin-like compounds
| Chemical | Water & Leachate | Air |
|---|---|---|
| Trichlorotoluene | 34 mg/l | 0.05-43.7 µg/m3 |
| Toluene | 250 mg/l | 0.1-6.2 mg/m3 |
| Dioxin (TCDD) | 1.4-5.1 ppt | |
| 1,2-Dichloroethylene | 0.1-0.1 µg/l | 334 µg/m3 |
Did you know there are chemicals in Love Canal?
Air tests by the county health department didn't turn up anything. But soil and dust testing conducted by a private company found traces of chemicals found at Love Canal, like chlorinated pesticides, dioxins and PCBs. And where do you think these chemicals came from?
Is there a hazardous waste deposition in the Love Canal?
Examination of the declaration of estimated disposition of chemical wastes submitted by the Hooker Chemical Company indicates the deposition in the Love Canal of many hazardous and toxic substances in large amounts.
What's in the brew at Love Canal?
Of the chemicals which comprise the brew seeping through the ground and into homes at Love Canal, one of the most prevalent is benzene -- a known human carcinogen, and one detected in high concentrations. But the residents characterize things more simply. "I've got this slop everywhere," said another man who lives at Love Canal.
What's going on with the Love Canal?
The Department of Environmental Conservation's concern over the Love Canal situation dates back to September 1976, when DEC engineers first visited the site to investigate the suspected discharge of Mirex by Hooker Chemical and Plastics Corporation.
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What chemicals were involved in the Love Canal disaster?
The Love Canal area was originally the site of an abandoned canal that became a dumping ground for nearly 22,000 tons of chemical waste (including polychlorinated biphenyls, dioxin, and pesticides) produced by the Hooker Chemicals and Plastics Corporation in the 1940s and '50s.
Is Love Canal still toxic 2020?
They say they found toxins "previously found in Love Canal-related sites." Indoors, toxins can get trapped and build up. Tests there found toxin levels 10 to 100 times higher. So far, state officials have declined to test inside residents' homes.
How many toxic chemicals were found in the Love Canal?
--Twenty five years after the Hooker Chemical Company stopped using the Love Canal here as an industrial dump, 82 different compounds, 11 of them suspected carcinogens, have been percolating upward through the soil, their drum containers rotting and leaching their contents into the backyards and basements of 100 homes ...
What company dumped toxins in Love Canal?
Hooker Chemical Company The Niagara Power and Development Company granted permission to Hooker during 1942 to dump wastes into the canal.
Is Love Canal safe to live in?
The head of the Environmental Protection Agency decided today that much of the Love Canal neighborhood in Niagara Falls, N.Y., is safe enough from chemical contamination to permit people to move back in. The decision, by the agency's Administrator, William K.
Was the Love Canal ever cleaned up?
Two decades after Love Canal became the first polluted site on the newly created Superfund list, federal officials announced yesterday that the neighborhood that epitomized environmental horror in the late 1970's was clean enough to be taken off the list.
Is Hooker Chemical still in business?
The company became notorious in the 1960s, when residents near its chemical waste site, Love Canal, reported extraordinarily high incidences of leukemia, birth defects, and other injuries....Hooker Chemical Company.TypePrivateDefunct1968FateAcquired by Occidental PetroleumArea servedUnited StatesProductschloralkali products4 more rows
What were the health effects of Love Canal?
From 1974 to 1978, 56% of the children in the Love Canal neighborhood were born with a birth defect, including three ears, a double row of teeth, and mental retardation. There were almost three times as many defects in historically wet areas. State health authorities quickly dismissed the study.
How many people died from the Love Canal?
Of the 725 deaths observed during the study period, 701 had cause-specific information; the remaining 24 deaths were reported by relatives and the cause was unknown.
Where did the chemicals in the Love Canal come from?
As it turns out, consecutive wet winters in the late 1970s raised the water table and caused the chemicals to leach (via underground swales and a sewer system that drained into nearby creeks) into the basements and yards of neighborhood residents, as well as into the playground of the elementary school built directly ...
What are the long term effects of the Love Canal?
The Love Canal landfill contained approximately 21,800 tons of chemical wastes. Substantial migration and contamination of soil, groundwater and basement air of nearby homes was apparent in the late 1970s.
What is the status of Love Canal now?
Love begins a canal to link the Niagara River to Lake Ontario. The partially completed canal is later abandoned. 1942-1952: Hooker Chemical and Plastics Corporation takes over the 15-acre canal site in 1942 and by 1952 has buried over 20,000 of tons of toxic chemicals there.
Are there still chemicals in Love Canal?
Reports that the federal government buried radioactive material at the Love Canal have not been substantiated. Laboratory analyses of soil and sediment samples from the Love Canal indicate the presence of more than 200 distinct organic chemical compounds; approximately 100 of these have been identified to date.
How many people died from the Love Canal?
Of the 725 deaths observed during the study period, 701 had cause-specific information; the remaining 24 deaths were reported by relatives and the cause was unknown.
What were the health effects of Love Canal?
From 1974 to 1978, 56% of the children in the Love Canal neighborhood were born with a birth defect, including three ears, a double row of teeth, and mental retardation. There were almost three times as many defects in historically wet areas. State health authorities quickly dismissed the study.
Why was the Love Canal sold?
Love Canal was sold to the local school district in 1953, after the threat of eminent domain. Over the next three decades, it attracted national attention for the public health problems originating from the former dumping of toxic waste on the grounds.
Why is the Love Canal important?
Love Canal, along with Times Beach, Missouri and the Valley of the Drums, Kentucky, are important in United States environmental history as three sites that significantly contributed to the passing of the CERCLA. Love Canal "become the symbol for what happens when hazardous industrial products are not confined to the workplace but 'hit people where they live' in inestimable amounts".
What was the name of the project that Love built?
He named the project Model City , New York. After 1892, Love's plan incorporated a shipping lane that would bypass Niagara Falls. He arranged backing from financial banks in New York City, Chicago, and England. During October 1893, the first factory opened for business. In May 1894, work on the canal began.
What was the Love Canal incident?
In 1988, New York State Department of Health Commissioner David Axelrod called the Love Canal incident a "national symbol of a failure to exercise a sense of concern for future generations". The Love Canal incident was especially significant as a situation where the inhabitants "overflowed into the wastes instead of the other way around".
Why did the media call the Love Canal a time bomb?
She declared that people were not falling ill because of exposure to chemical waste, but from stress caused by the media. Besides double the rate of birth defects to children born while living on Love Canal, a follow-up study two decades after the incident "showed increased risks of low birth weight, congenital malformations and other adverse reproductive events".
Where is the Love Canal?
Love Canal is a neighborhood located in the city of Niagara Falls in the northwestern region of New York state . The neighborhood covers 36 blocks in the far southeastern corner of the city, stretching from 93rd Street comprising the western border to 100th Street in the east border and 103rd Street in the northeast. Bergholtz Creek defines the northern border with the Niagara River marking the southern border one-quarter mile (400 m) away. The LaSalle Expressway splits an uninhabited portion of the south from the north. The canal covers 16 acres (6.5 ha) of land in the central eastern portion.
When was the Love Canal created?
Decades of dumping toxic chemicals harmed the health of hundreds of residents; the area was cleaned up over the course of 21 years in a Superfund operation. In 1890, Love Canal was created as a model planned community, but was only partially developed.
When was the Love Canal study conducted?
Many health studies were conducted in the late 1970s and early 1980s to determine whether chemical exposures at Love Canal caused any immediate health effects. Each study, however, has limitations that may lead to inconclusive or contradictory results.
When was the Love Canal declared a public health emergency?
In August 1978 , New York State Department of Health Commissioner Robert P. Whalen declared a public health emergency at the Love Canal hazardous waste landfill site. Since then, numerous health studies have been conducted and reports have been published.
What is the highest dioxin level in the Love Canal?
The highest level of dioxin quantified to date at the Love Canal is approximately 300 parts per billion (ppb) in a storm sewer adjoining the canal.
How many analyses have been done on the Love Canal?
Since March 1978, the State Health Department's Division of Laboratories and Research has carried out more than 6,000 analyses of environmental and biological samples associated with the Love Canal.
What was the Love Canal Task Force?
Recognizing the complexity of the Love Canal situation and the necessity for close coordination of all State activities and assistance, the Governor, on August 3, 1978, directed the formation of an interagency Love Canal Task Force. The task force, headed by the State Commissioner of Transportation, included representatives of the departments of Health, Transportation, Environmental Conservation, Social Services, Banking, Insurance, Equalization & Assessment, Division of Housing & Community Renewal and Office of Disaster Preparedness. An on-site task force group, composed of representatives of the State agencies most directly involved, was immediately established and headquartered at the 99th Street School.
How many homes were there on the Love Canal?
In spring 1978, when the State of New York first intervened at Love Canal, there were 99 homes with backyards directly abutting the canal in which 230 adults and 134 children resided. A total of 410 students were enrolled in the elementary school that had been built in 1954.
Where is the Love Canal landfill?
One of these is the Love Canal landfill, in which the Hooker Electrochemical Company, now the Hooker Chemical and Plastics Corporation, admits to the deposition, between 1942 and 1953, of 21,800 tons of chemical wastes from its plants in Niagara Falls.
When was the Love Canal sold?
The City of Niagara Falls also used the site for disposal of municipal wastes for a number of years, concluding in 1953. In April 1953 , Hooker sold the Love Canal property, to which it then held title, to the City of Niagara Falls Board of Education.
Does the Department of Environmental Conservation continue on-site supervision of the on-going remedial work at the Love Canal?
That the Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation continue on-site supervision of the on-going remedial work at the Love Canal Chemical Landfill site.
What company dumped toxic waste in the Love Canal?
MEGAN THOMPSON: A company called Hooker Chemical had dumped 22,000 tons of toxic waste in an unfinished canal nearby. Love Canal chemicals started seeping into residents' basements and backyards, bubbling up on the school's playground.
What is the Love Canal?
Love Canal became known as one of the nation's worst environmental disasters. It led to the creation of the federal Superfund program that oversees the remediation of dangerous hazardous waste sites. This is Love Canal today. A bare 70-acre lot, surrounded by a chain-link fence.
Why did the EPA keep the toxic waste in the landfill?
The EPA kept the nearly 22,000 tons of toxic waste right where they were, in a specialized landfill because digging up and transporting the hazardous waste would pose its own dangers.
What diseases did Salerno have?
Salerno says she's developed migraines and pulmonary fibrosis, a lung disease. Air tests by the county health department didn't turn up anything. But soil and dust testing conducted by a private company found traces of chemicals found at Love Canal, like chlorinated pesticides, dioxins and PCBs. MEGAN THOMPSON:
Is the Love Canal safe?
Forty years ago this week, President Jimmy Carter declared Love Canal a national health emergency when the small community near Niagara Falls, New York, learned that their homes and school were built on 22,000 tons of chemicals. Today, many residents in the area, which was deemed safe by authorities, claim to be facing health problems.
What agencies are involved in the Love Canal?
Well before completion of the Department of Health's preliminary assessment of the scope of the health hazard posed by the Love Canal leachate, the Governor's Office began making preparations to mobilize the expertise and resources of key State agencies, including the Departments of Transportation, Health, Environmental Conservation, Housing, Social Services, Banking, Insurance, Office of Disaster Preparedness and Division of Equalization and Assessment. An initial step was a market survey by Department of Transportation real estate experts to determine availability of temporary and permanent replacement housing and to estimate the cost of relocating Love Canal residents and purchasing their homes.
Who is responsible for the remedial engineering plans at the Love Canal?
Following issuance of Health Commissioner Whalen's August 2 order, the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) assumed overall responsibility for reviewing remedial engineering plans at the Love Canal.
What was the heart of Love's plan?
The heart of Love's plan was a power canal that would connect the upper and lower levels of the Niagara River. With a canal only six or seven miles in length, water could be conveyed to the Niagara Terrace, from which there was a drop of over 300 feet to the lower level.
What happened to the Love project?
No longer was it necessary for industry to locate near the source of electrical power. Love's project was de alt a death blow. His backers deserted him, and the last of the property owned by his corporation was subjected to mortgage foreclosure and sold at public auction in 1910.
How many people did Love's plan accommodate?
By January of 1893, Love felt he had enough prominent people in favor of his idea to publicly announce his plan for a model city which would accommodate up to 600,000 people. He claimed before he could advance his plan further he would need control of 10,000 acres.
What chapter is the Love Canal crisis?
In accordance with Chapter 487 of the New York State Laws of 1978, I hereby submit to you a Special Report on the Love Canal crisis.
When was the Love Canal built?
Love Canal: A Brief History. In 1836, a U.S. Government engineer surveyed the Niagara County area, looking for a possible site for a ship canal to connect the lakes Erie and Ontario.
What was the Love Canal used for?
Love Canal’s notorious history began when Hooker Chemical Co. used the abandoned canal from 1942 to 1953 to dump 21,800 tons of industrial hazardous waste. That canal was later capped, and homes and a school were built on top of it.
How much was the Love Canal cleanup?
Although complete streets were permanently bulldozed around Love Canal, those immediately north and west of the landfill were refurbished following a $230 million cleanup that involved capping the canal with clay, a plastic liner and topsoil.
How many acres of water was buried in the canal?
That canal was later capped, and homes and a school were built on top of it. But snow melt from an unusually harsh winter in 1977 seeped into the buried 16-acre canal and forced chemical waste into groundwater and to the surface, oozing into yards and basements.
Who bought the chemical dump?
The main target of the lawsuits, Occidental Petroleum Corp., which bought the company that dumped the chemicals and was tasked by the state with monitoring the site in 1995, contends the waste is contained and that state and federal agencies back up those findings.
Do Reynoldses believe in containment?
The Reynoldses are unconvinced that the containment system ever really worked and believe chemicals have been spreading for years, noting their home is just outside the original emergency zone.
Overview
Love Canal disaster
At the time of the dump's closure in 1952, Niagara Falls was experiencing prosperity, and the population had been expanding dramatically, growing by 31% in twenty years (1940–1960) from 78,020 to 102,394.
By the end of the 1940s, Hooker Chemical Company was searching for a place to dispose its large quantity of chemical waste. The Niagara Power and Develop…
Geography
Love Canal is a neighborhood located in the city of Niagara Falls in the northwestern region of New York state. The neighborhood covers 36 blocks in the far southeastern corner of the city, stretching from 93rd Street comprising the western border to 100th Street in the east border and 103rd Street in the northeast. Bergholtz Creek defines the northern border with the Niagara River marking the southern border one-quarter mile (400 m) away. The LaSalle Expressway splits an u…
Early history
In 1890, William T. Love, an ambitious railroad entrepreneur, prepared plans to construct a preplanned urban community of parks and residences on the shore of Lake Ontario, believing it would serve the area's burgeoning industries with much-needed hydroelectricity. He named the project Model City, New York.
After 1892, Love's plan incorporated a shipping lane that would bypass Niagara Falls. He arrang…
In popular culture
The legacy of the disaster inspired a fictionalized 1982 made-for-TV film titled Lois Gibbs and the Love Canal. An award-winning documentary by Lynn Corcoran titled In Our Own Backyard was released in the U.S. in 1983. Modern Marvels retold the disaster in 2004.
Joyce Carol Oates included the story of Love Canal in her 2004 novel The Falls, but changed the time period of the disaster to the 1960s. The latest history of Love Canal is Paradise Falls: The T…
See also
• 102nd Street chemical landfill, a landfill located immediately to the south of Love Canal.
• Superfund
• Cancer Alley (in Louisiana)
• Landfills in the United States
External links
• Love Canal Collections in the University Archives, University at Buffalo Libraries
• Adeline Levine Love Canal Papers at The Buffalo History Museum
• Love Canal Medical Fund, Inc.
• New York Heritage: Love Canal Images