Cooper's Comments 4

A recent article in the Irish Independent highlighted the plight of our rivers and lakes. Treacy Hogan, the environment corespondent for the newspaper, quoted from the latest EPA report, River Shannon, Lake Water Monitoring 1999.

The fact that the country's waterway is now an open sewer full of deadly toxins is well documented. It states that the byproduct of the heavy phosphorous deposits, both from farming and inadequate sewage operations, that blight our rivers and lakes is the deadly cyanobacteria. For those of you who have nerver seen this nasty stuff let me tell you a little about it. My first dealings with cyanobacteria was as a fisheries and pollution officer with Anglian Water in the early 70's. It appeared on Grafham Water, at the time one of Britain's major trout fisheries. It usually appears during periods of warm weather and shows itself on the shorelines of prevailing winds. The alarm was raised at Grafham when dogs being taken for walks by their owners started to die in excruciating agony after drinking the water. Samples taken of the vividly coloured blue-green algae revealed high concentrations of cyanide. You don't have to be a member of Mensa to realize that if this stuff goes undetected we could have a potential tragedy on our hands.

The stuff now regularly appears on many of our river and lake shorelines. Last year Roy Stevenson and myself witnessed heavy deposits of it along a lake shoreline not too far from my home in Tarmonbarry. What alarmed us further was the number of sheep carcasses that also littered the area adjoining the water. I can tell you the stench was unbelievable.

In the article Dr. Jim Bowman of the EPA is quoted as saying people should avoid contact with algae scum on shorelines. Damned right you should if you don't want to end up very sick or dead!

The situation leads me to ask what is to be done immediately about this very, very serious problem. A killer lurks amongst us with the full knowledge of the Irish government. In any other country within the E.U. I suspect a stink would be detected from the source of the problem all the way to Brussels. I guess here however another survey will be set up. More people wandering around taking more water samples. More and more delays whilst nothing is done.

I suppose the economics of it all are plain to see. To eradicate the problem means spending a serious amount of cash now. Something which has become blatantly obvious this government will not do when it comes down to the environment in which creatures live. It is my opinion that providing most of the population of this country are blissfully unaware that Ireland stands on the edge of a catastrophic environmental precipice nothing will be done.

Perhaps an independent report to our masters within the E.U. may prompt some kind of a response which is now long overdue.

Geoff Cooper
P.R.O.

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