Follow-up by Cheri Rae
The leaking underground storage tank unearthed under the boiler room at the former St. Francis hospital demolition site was removed yesterday, and transported to Kettleman City for disposal.
And work crews are set to collect soil samples at the site to test for a number of contaminants related to the tank, according to the work plan as specified by the Santa Barbara County Fire Prevention Division.
The sludge found in the tank tested at high levels for the following contaminants:
Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons (TPH), n Butylbenzene, sec-Butylbenzene, Isopropylbenzene; Naphthalene, n-Propylbenzene, as well as Barium and Lead.
Remaining soil and groundwater samples are required to be analyzed for the following:
*Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons (TPH)
*Full-scale volatile organic compounds (VOCs) including but not limited to:
ethylene dibromide (EDB),1,2-dicholorothane (EDC), benzene, toluene,
ethylbenzene and xylenes (BTEX); the fuel oxygenates di-isopropyl ether (DIPE), ethyl tertiary butyl ether (ETBE), ethanol, methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE), tertiary butyl ether (TBA), and tertiary amyl methyl ether (TAME); and the recalcitrant constituents n-butylbenzene, sec-butylbenzene, tert-butylbenzene, naphthalene, isoropylbenzene, isopropyltoluene, n-propylenzene, 1,2,4-trimethylbenzene, and 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene;
*the 16 priority pollutant polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) naththalene, cenaphthene, acenaphthylene, anthracene, phenanthrene, fluorine, chrysene, fuoranthene, pyrene, benso(b)flouranthene, benzo(a)pyrene, benzo(k)fluoranthene, benzo(a)anthracene, ideno(1,2,3-c,d)pyrene, dibenz(a,h)anthracene, benzo(g,h,i) perylene;
*the soil will be tested for a number of metals, including lead and barium
The work—which requires air monitoring and a specific health and safety plan—will be supervised by a licensed professional geologist or civil engineer; inspected by the FPD Hazardous Waste Specialist and completed by October 14, 2010.
To track the developments regarding the leaking underground storage tank at St. Francis, check the State website.
David Burke told KEYT that the failure to report the leaking tank was a “procedural boo boo”.
oh no – is the ground water in the whole area contaminated?
good to see santa barabra view and keyt covering real issues, a potentially dangerous issue.. and not the petty bickering stuff we see all the time in the news press and edhat. real journalism, refreshing. investigative stuff, asking questions, caring about the community. bravo.
The complete test results should be known by October 14th. And a second kudos to KEYT for following-up on this story and making it the 6pm lead.
Thank you for breaking this important story, Cheri Rae and Santa Barbara View. May your success and readership increase.