Staff photo / Ed Runyan About a half-dozen workers using heavy equipment work on a liner installation in a ditch next to the Mill Creek MetroParks Bikeway in Canfield. The area where they were working last week is across from the Canfield High School sports stadium. The work is related to a hazardous-chemical spill in July.

CANFIELD — A July 11 liquid chemical release at the Material Sciences Corp. steel processing facility west of Canfield High School has developed into a growing concern as the investigation and cleanup expand.

Testing of areas of school property was set to begin as soon as this weekend after testing in areas adjacent to the school complex showed the presence of hazardous chemicals, resulting in a decision to see if the chemicals are also on school property.

August Mack Engineering, the company MSC hired to assist with spill cleanup and testing of soils and waterways, has provided documents and updates on a website to educate the public. But a Dec. 12 3,050-page Initial Site Investigation report by August Mack leaves a lot of unanswered questions.

It contains helpful explanations of what happened, straightforward language explaining the testing, cleanup and types of chemicals found. But it also uses scientific terms and includes thousands of pages of testing results nearly impossible for an ordinary person to decipher.

Some have tried, including Brad Kinkade, who lives south of the leak area and who brought the severity of the leak to the public’s attention at a Canfield City Council meeting Oct. 2.

The Dec. 12 August Mack document states MSC started to operate the plant at 460 W. Main Street as a metal galvanizing and metal coil coating facility in 2013, but the plant was built in the 1950s and was operated by other companies during the earlier decades.

In July, MSC carried out a regularly scheduled cleaning of its equipment at the plant, which “appeared to dislodge dark, brown process water … that contained cyanide and metals,” the report states. The fluids got into a “previously abandoned drainage pipe” and then into a ditch that runs from the rear corner of the building north along the Mill Creek MetroParks Bikeway, it states.

A pedestrian on the bikeway noticed the fluid at 1:50 p.m. July 11 and called 911, leading to a response by the Cardinal Joint Fire District, Mahoning County HazMat team and the Ohio EPA, according to a fire report.

The companies MSC hired to clean the spill were going to be “working through the night and into” July 12 to clean up the leak, the report stated. Firefighters left the scene at 6:23 p.m. Their report estimated the amount of chemicals leaked at 50 gallons.

The first news report on the leak appeared July 24 when it was reported the Ohio EPA was investigating a July 11 discharge at the plant that was possibly impacting Sawmill Creek. It stated the Ohio EPA issued a notice of violation to MSC, the leak was stopped and the cleanup was ongoing.

Little more was said about it until the Oct. 2 Canfield City Council meeting, when Kinkade told council members he had been talking with officials at the cleanup site. He said he was advised that dangerous chemicals were involved and excavation of the affected areas alone would not be enough to “take care of the problem.”

Kinkade told city officials that news reporting indicating the leak was “contained and is finished” was not accurate.

“As of today, the EPA has required (testing) samples from the ditch, the wetlands and they are recommending (testing of) Sawmill Creek all the way to Cardinal Drive because of the potential that it can become contaminated as well,” Kinkade said at the time.

He described the significant ramp-up he was seeing in the area of the ditch alongside the bike trail over the previous five days — a higher fence beside the bike trail, “trucks in the wetlands pumping out the physical wetlands in the preserve. They were running all day Saturday (Feb. 8),” he said.

Canfield City Council President Christine Oliver expressed shock that she and other council members were just learning about the spill that day from Kinkade, though City Manager David D’Apolito said he knew about it.

“We were told it was contained,” and “We were never contacted again,” D’Apolito said at the Oct. 2 meeting.

What Kinkade described Oct. 2 is similar to what a person walking along the bike trail can see now — a high fence with a dark material covering it and workers using heavy equipment in the ditch and in areas farther back. The work on the ditch appears to be nearing completion. Documents state MSC contractors are changing the shape of the ditch, installing 1,200 feet of liner and covering the ditch with stone.

Kurt Kollar, an Ohio EPA Emergency Response Unit Leader, said at the Nov. 8 Canfield City Council meeting that the ditch was going to be scraped the following week.

He said the liquid in the ditch came from MSC’s metal-coating process, and testing of the ditch showed elevated levels of sodium hydroxide, zinc, chromium and cyanide. Kollar said the fence by the bike trail was erected to prevent people from being burned by having the chemicals in the ditch make contact with their skin. He cited no airborne threat from the fluids.

THG & Associates and Environmental Response Contractor are among the companies that have worked at the site, in addition to August Mack, collecting and disposing of impacted stormwater and other tasks, the report states. August Mack conducted testing within the ditch, a surface-water area just south of the ditch and a tributary of Sawmill Creek, the report states.

The creek travels west-east at the south end of the ditch and is downstream from the ditch. When it leaves the ditch area, it travels east across the northern boundary of the Canfield High School property and then continues through Canfield to the north. None of the water that leaked from the factory in July has made it past the “line of compliance” at the end of the ditch, the Dec. 12 report stated. The creek is in the back yards of about a dozen homes on South Briarcliff Drive.

KINKADE

Kinkade said in an interview last week with The Vindicator that he believes the soil and water testing that MSC has done suggests that dangerous chemicals from the plant have migrated from the plant, ditch and creek.

He said results of testing show chemicals have been found in soil on the east side of the Mill Creek MetroParks Bikeway, which is east of the factory and east of the ditch where much work has been done to remove contaminants.

“There is no water source there, so that leads me to believe that that area has been saturated” with hazardous chemicals, Kinkade said of the area just east of the bike trail. He said the testing results obtained so far are one reason he believes the factory has been releasing hazardous chemicals for a long time.

He said the testing planned for the high school complex will tell officials whether there is trichloroethylene (TCE) in the soil, but that is not one of the chemicals that investigators showed concern for until recently.

“Every time they go and find one thing, something else pops up,” Kinkade said. “The TCE wasn’t even an issue until about six weeks ago. Now all of a sudden that has become something else that is on the radar. It’s like they opened Pandora’s Box.”

He added, “It’s going to be one of those things that takes years and years to clean up, if ever. And I just hope the company sticks around long enough to do it.”

Kinkade said he does not believe the July chemical release explains the testing results suggesting “historic” chemical releases from the plant.

“I think over the course of time, tanks have leaked, pipes have leaked, storage tanks have given way. And over time, the stuff has saturated the soil,” Kinkade said. He added that MSC has not addressed where the “historic” contaminants may have come from, and when he asks the Ohio EPA where the “historic” contaminants originated, “they reference you back to the MSC response website.”

Kinkade said he also has read “all of the reports from the East Palestine (derailment), and people have been quoted as saying what (investigators) like to do is put everybody in a bubble, including the company” and withhold information. “We still have a right to know,” he said.

He also wishes Canfield officials would take a more forceful position.

“We are seven months in, and we still have not identified a source for the historic contamination, nothing has been told about the levels that have been found and the risk” to the public, he said.

He wonders if the chemicals involved in this release might prove to be as significant as major contaminations in the state’s history.

He has looked up information on other Ohio toxic chemical releases, and the “chemicals and the disbursal and the distance they have gone are less than what we are dealing with now.”

Kinkade said he wishes he could find out how much of the hazardous chemicals are in the ground. “Obviously it’s toxic, but how toxic? How dangerous is it? They don’t give any of that,” he said of the people handling this investigation.

JAN 14 MEMO

A Jan. 14 August Mack memo to the Ohio EPA states that the testing results provided in the Dec. 12 report showed that in five locations tested near the back of the factory, groundwater contained TCE levels above the U.S. EPA Maximum Contaminant Level.

Sampling of “grab groundwater” indicated that that TCE exceeded the GroundWater Protection standards in five of 15 locations in the ditch and wetlands just north of the factory, hexavalent chromium exceeded the standards in four samples and total zinc exceeded the standards in five samples.

Soil samples from the ditch showed that zinc exceeded the residential Regional Screening Levels (RSL)s in 20 samples, and hexavalent chromium exceeded residential RSL in two samples. Total cyanide exceeded the industrial Regional Screening Levels in 47 samples; and 15 samples exceeded the residential RSLs.

Soil samples from Sawmill Creek showed that zinc exceeded the residential RSLs in six samples, hexavalent chromium exceeded the residential RSLs in six samples and total cyanide exceeded the residential RSLs in 52 samples.

The report states that since July, the company has taken about 329 samples, including 24 from groundwater, 79 from soil and four from surface water in the ditch, 47 from soil and two from surface water at a surface water location south of the plant, and 69 from soil and three from water in Sawmill Creek.

August Mack said in December it planned to do additional soil sampling in Sawmill Creek to determine additional measures, such as fencing around the creek.

The Jan. 14 memo also states that August Mack was proposing to install temporary soil-gas sampling points — six at Canfield High School and six near the ditch and bike trail.

It also proposed collecting two indoor air and sub-slab samples from two structures on the western portion of the high school “to ensure no potential indoor air exposures are occurring. These structures include a locker / weight room and a concession stand.”

The company also proposed collecting eight groundwater samples adjacent to the bike trail and three groundwater samples on the high school property.

A newer Ohio EPA document, dated Feb. 4 and released Wednesday, states that because of findings in the Dec. 12 Initial Site Investigation report of elevated trichloroethylene (TCE) levels in five groundwater samples just north of the factory, soil-vapor probes will be installed just east of the bike trail near the rear of the factory.

The purpose of the probes is to check for “additional site-specific contaminants of concern.” August Mack will be looking for “total and dissolved RCRA 8 metals, hexavalent chromium, free cyanide and total cyanide,” the document states.

The sampling efforts were set to take place Friday through Monday, the document states.

SCHOOL DISTRICT

Canfield Local Schools Superintendent Joe Knoll confirmed at the Wednesday Canfield Board of Education meeting that testing related to the MSC spill was going to take place this weekend on the high school property, saying it would be done in the school parking lot on the western edge of the property and in two buildings — the weight room building and a concession stand.

The board voted to give permission to August Mack to enter the property to conduct the testing. There was no mention of testing in the high school. Knoll said the testing would take place unless it rained. The board also gave permission for August Mack to install a fence on the north end of its property — on the south side of Sawmill Creek.

When board members asked questions about the testing, Knoll said August Mack indicated it would take three to four weeks to receive the results of the testing, but it might take longer for the school district to receive them.

When Knoll was asked what the “mandate” of the school board would be after the results are obtained, Knoll said, “There is no mandate to us at all. We’re not responsible to fix anything, to clean anything up, no responsibility for the board at all. That all falls on August Mack. Whatever those results say, August Mack will have to move forward with whatever plan the EPA puts in place.”

Knoll noted that the reason for the testing is “because of this TCE (trichloroethylene) as you remember. Or if they don’t find it and there’s nothing to move forward, that’s fine as well,” he said.

Board member Steven DeMaiolo asked if August Mack would then be responsible for addressing the results, and Kroll said yes. “There will be some type of plan in place.”

Knoll thanked the board for supporting the hiring of a consultant to assist Knoll in understanding the results of the testing.

“I know this is kind of uncharted water for us, but I do appreciate being proactive and accepting my recommendation to bring these people on site and do this testing. I know this isn’t something we should be having to worry about, but it’s here, so I appreciate your support moving forward,” he said.

Board member Nader Atway thanked Kroll, saying the school is a “participant in trying to make sure our students and staff are safe and protected.” DeMaiolo asked Knoll if he would ask MSC to pay for the cost of hiring the expert, and Atway said he would handle that.

WEBSITE

MSC is operating a website to provide documents to the public regarding the liquid leaked from the plant. The site also contains a running storyline on the fluid leak. The page was last updated Jan. 15.

The storyline states that the investigation into the fluid leak found that “elevated concentrations of chemicals associated with the metal plating process were discovered in the ditch. These are believed to be the result of releases that have occurred over the life of the facility.”

The idea that contaminants were detected that date back to before MSC owned the plant has been mentioned several times recently. At a Jan. 2 Canfield City Council meeting, City Manager D’Apolito said that investigators learned while investigating the liquid release that leaks dating back before MSC owned the factory were discovered.

D’Apolito referenced the “historical issue that has been happening for decades,” and Canfield City Attorney Mark Fortunato mentioned that the cleanup of the spill involves some “historical cleanup.” Fortunato said the final “findings and orders” to MSC issued by Ohio EPA Director Anne Vogel on Jan. 7 regarding the spill offer support for that notion.

The findings and orders state that Life Time Products Corporation built the factory in 1950 and used it to manufacture coated steel products and became known as Canfield Steel, then Pittsburgh Steel in 1968 and then Pittsburgh-Canfield Corp. through the early 1970s.

The document does not address who owned it from the early 1970s until MSC bought it in 2013, but it states that hazardous wastes have been generated there from metal preparation, plating and painting operations.

The Vindicator obtained an Ohio EPA document from the Ohio EPA website dated July 22, 1992. It was addressed to the Pittsburgh-Canfield Corp. It was a notice of violation based on a June 17, 1992, Ohio EPA inspection of the facility that found violations related to the handling of hazardous wastes.

One was not properly labeling drums and tanks stored on the property as “Hazardous Waste” that contained chemicals such as chromic acid. Some containers also were not dated, the document states.

Another was finding that a “roll off box” used to accumulate waste fluids containing cyanide-bearing calcium carbonate was not covered with a tarp as required. It also stated that the area where containers are stored must be inspected for “evidence of leaks or corrosion once a week. The facility must record these inspections in a log or inspection summary,” it states. “In order to abate this violation, please submit three weeks of completed inspection checklists,” the document states.

Among the 10 violations noted, another was that a “satellite drum was not labeled as ‘hazardous waste’ or as spent solvent.”

A followup document Aug. 26, 1992, indicated that most of the violations had been corrected. A followup letter Oct. 6, 1992, addressed the “remaining violation,” had been rectified.

SAWMILL CREEK

The Vindicator visited several homes on Briarcliff Drive last week and spoke with property owners. One allowed a reporter to see the Residential Property Access Request he or she received recently from August Mack.

Sawmill Creek is in the backyards of the homes on the south side of Briarcliff Drive in an area where water and soil testing was done by August Mack at the request of the Ohio EPA.

The document summarized the July spill at MSC and the companies that have operated at the MSC site since the 1950s. It stated that the investigations that followed the leak “have discovered that the process water has likely leaked from the facility during historical operations, and the residual impacts appear to have migrated downstream” from the ditch near the plant “and into the wetlands … and towards the tributary of Sawmill Creek.” It mentioned the soil sampling that was done previously and referred the property owner to results of testing done on the person’s property being attached to the letter.

It states that the results showed that cyanide and metals above the U.S. E.P.A. “Residential Screening criteria in soils within the tributary of Sawmill Creek” were found.

The letter states that the Ohio EPA had requested that additional soil sampling be done in the creek, including on the homeowner’s portion of the creek. The letter requested access to the creek and permission to install a temporary fence on the homeowner’s side of the creek.

The work would be done at no cost to the homeowner, and the sampling results will be provided to the property owner, the letter states. The creek testing and fence work will take no more than several days, the letter states. A temporary easement agreement with the letter stated that the agreement would last five years. The letter stated that terms of the agreement are negotiable.

The person was asked to return the document to August Mack by Feb. 28.

Dan Williamson, senior vice president of Paul Werth Associates Public Relations and Marketing of Columbus, which is assisting MSC and August Mack, stated in an email that August Mack will sample soil, sediment and surface water in the Sawmill Creek Tributary for residents who have been asked for permission, and erect a temporary fence around the sampling area.

“MSC will then work with the Ohio EPA, and the data collected during this effort will be used to determine the appropriate next steps,” he said.

One property owner on Briarcliff Drive said learning that cyanide is one of the chemicals associated with the factory chemical release was significant because of issues a member of his family has experienced, such as rashes and anxiety.

The resident said not only have children who live along Briarcliff played in the creek over time, but the open play areas of the high school side of the creek are home to various activities, such as flag football. Soccer goals are also set up in that area as are baseball fields.

They said when there are flag football tournaments on those fields, “Hundreds of kids show up. And when they are not playing, where do you think they are? They are kids. They are playing in the creek,” the resident said.