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A news item involving 2015 Gold King Mine waste water spill was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the In the news section on 11 August 2015.

Nominated for WP:ITN

The article has been nominated for listing at In the News on the fron page. Pleas feel free to comment at the nomination, and avoid adding any unreferenced material to the article. μηδείς (talk) 00:22, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Chart

I'd suggest not including this chart. It makes the article suddenly harder to read; the readings were taken upstream; the readings could change; the readings may be irrelevant to the main topic, the spill.

--Light show (talk) 04:08, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

The readings were taken 15 miles upstream of Durango. Silverton is about 45 miles upstream of Durango. I don't think they're irrelevant. It's true they could change, although they will probably decrease.

I don't like stressing "times over limit"; I think it's a newsy way of getting shockingly large numbers (percents are even worse). The acceptable values for drinking water are in the ppb range, parts per billion, because drinking water shouldn't have metals in it at all. The limits are a numerical equivalent to "as close to zero as we're likely to find in natural water." Now, 1,000 ppb is 1 ppm, 1 part per million. One part per million is 0.0001%, one milligram per liter.

That doesn't mean I'd drink water with 5.7 ppm of lead, but I didn't like how the article stated "times over limit" without saying what the limit was. It's a comparison of two very small numbers, and it can be misleading to compare two very small numbers as a ratio; the numbers should be ppb. Roches (talk) 23:18, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Color

One of the most striking characteristics of this mishap is the bright orange color. Has anyone read any explanation for the color? Is it related to the toxic materials in any way? Spiel496 (talk) 21:20, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

It certainly is related to the toxic materials. Most of the color is attributable to the iron and copper. Iron and copper can produce various reds, yellows and oranges, and the effect of mixing them is the same as mixing paints. The orange is a startling color, but it's seen in many places. See Acid mine drainage for an explanation and for other examples.

The really dangerous materials like lead and cadmium are not present in a high enough concentration to affect the color. Roches (talk) 23:31, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, Roches, that was helpful. I think including a sentence and link in the article would be good. For example, "The orange color in mine discharge is due to precipitates of iron hydroxide and other minerals associated with the acidic chemistry within the mine." Just something to indicate that the color is one of many things going on, and does not itself reveal the toxicity. In fact, non-soluble stuff like that should be of least concern, right? Spiel496 (talk) 00:39, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Though a large part of it is likely the metals, in part its probably the muds, and other sediments that accumulated in the tailing ponds, beside just the metal. If you have ever seen pictures of areas with red clay after construction, and during a heavy rain: the rivers can get quite reddie/brown. Sadads (talk) 00:00, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

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