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L<B>and</B><B>mine</B> Page 14 of 20 <br /> gotten the message: The legislature would not tolerate interference with <br /> mining, Baldridge said. <br /> Several workers took jobs in the private sector, including Baldridge. <br /> Eventually, she ended up at the company Galactic hired to draft a cleanup <br /> plan for Summitville. <br /> By that time it was too late. <br /> Acid spills into area's creeks <br /> Behind the dike, the water was rising. In addition to the polluted water being <br /> pumped back, spring snowmelt rushed into the pool from nearby Cropsy <br /> Peak. <br /> Water was sprayed on roads and fields to make it evaporate. <br /> "Somebody came up with the idea that you could make snow up there," <br /> recalled Wyman, the Galactic executive. 'We made snow as many months <br /> of the year as we could because snow does not all melt... in the sunshine. <br /> Some of it evaporates." <br /> As alarming as the rising water was the acid in it. <br /> When water flows over the newly exposed faces of fractured rock, it turns <br /> acidic. The acid dissolves minerals in the rocks, such as copper and <br /> cadmium. <br /> The acidic, mineralized water kills aquatic life. • <br /> As in many western states, the rocks in Colorado's mountains are highly <br /> acid-forming. <br /> Galactic's huge mining equipment was ripping the face off South Mountain, <br /> creating an enormous, acid-generating scar. Nearby, a new mountain of <br /> acid-generating waste rock was rising. <br /> Even the roads, carved from the hillsides to bring ore to the cyanide <br /> leaching area, produced acid. <br /> And then it got worse. <br /> At some point, the company's giant diggers tore through to the abandoned <br /> 19th century mines. A deluge of acidic water from the Galactic pit inundated <br /> the old mines, then flowed into area creeks through the system that drained <br /> the abandoned pits. <br /> Cyanide evaporates quickly, especially on sunny summer days. But acid <br /> lasts indefinitely. And more of it is produced every time rain or melting snow <br /> flows over acid-generating rock. <br /> In 1989, the company opened a water treatment plant in an effort to legally <br /> dump the water building up behind the dike. But the plant never worked <br /> properly, and the company spent its few remaining years quarreling with the <br /> state's Water Quality Control Division, which refused to allow water to be <br /> discharged. <br /> • <br /> Meanwhile, the acid was entering the Alamosa River. And poisoning the <br /> http://www.denver-rmn.com/news/0507smmtl.shtml 5/7/00 <br />