Military
linked to Cape water taint
Bourne shuts wells, seeks new supply
By Beth Daley, Globe Staff
4/11/2002
BOURNE - A chemical used in military explosives
has contaminated the drinking water for thousands of people in
this town, providing the first clear evidence that pollution from
years of training with grenades and rockets at the Massachusetts
Military Reservation is now seeping into Cape Cod's underground
water supply.
Three of the Bourne Water District's six
wells have been shut down in the last month after trace levels
of perchlorate were discovered. Officials anticipate a fourth
well will be closed soon because the chemical is moving through
nearby ground water at the rate of about a foot a day. The four
wells clustered together provide 70 percent of the water for a
summertime population of 19,000 people. Also yesterday, a well
at a private Sandwich home was found to contain the same chemical.
''This is our worst nightmare come true,''
said Tom Cambareri, water resource program manager for the Cape
Cod Commission, a regional planning agency. ''Not only are the
contaminants being found in the ground water, but [in] public
water supply wells. It's migrating off the base.''
With the region already hit hard by a drought,
Bourne and state officials are now scrambling to find enough water
for residents by summertime. Bourne Water District manager Ralph
Marks flew to Washington last night to ask the Army for money
to build a 3-mile pipeline to reach a water supply on the northeast
corner of the base. Bourne officials may also be able to get water
from nearby towns, but even if that succeeds, residents may be
in for severe water restrictions this summer.
Environmental and military officials have
been fighting over the use of explosives for National Guard training
at the base since 1997, when the US Environmental Protection Agency
ordered a suspension of use of live ammunition until its environmental
effects were better understood. At the time, military officials
insisted that explosives had not contaminated the ground water.
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