Government investigators squarely blame the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for a 3 million gallon wastewater spill from a Colorado gold mine, saying a cleanup crew rushed its work and failed to consider the complex engineering involved, triggering the very blowout it hoped to avoid.
The Interior Department probe concludes that the spill that fouled rivers in three states would have been avoided had the EPA team checked on water levels before digging into the mine.
The Associated Press obtained the investigation's findings on the Aug. 5 spill prior to their public release on Thursday. The 132-page report has implications across the United States, where hundreds of thousands of abandoned mines have yet to be cleaned up.
Meanwhile, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has denied the Navajo Nation's request for an emergency declaration due to the spill.
Tribal President Russell Begaye made the request earlier this month. Tribal officials have said they're unsatisfied with the response of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which unleashed 3 million gallons of toxic wastewater from a Colorado gold mine in August.
That water flowed into the San Juan River, which runs through the northern part of the Navajo Nation.
FEMA said this week that most of the response and recovery efforts for the spill fall under the authority of other federal agencies and denied Begaye's request.
Begaye called FEMA's decision ill-advised and said he will appeal. He says the spill devastated the Navajo Nation culturally and economically.
