Cyanide Spill Being Monitored Salmon Team Concerned About Hecla Mine Mishap

The Columbia Basin Salmon Enforcement Team is monitoring the aftermath of another cyanide spill in critical salmon habitat of central Idaho’s Yankee Fork of the Salmon River basin.

“It is very likely that there were concentrations in the creek that caused toxicity,” said Chris Mebane, monitoring supervisor for the Idaho Division of Environmental Quality. “We want to revisit their operation to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

The spill was discovered Aug. 21 after a slurry pipeline burst at Hecla Mining Co.’s open-pit gold mine north of Sunbeam. Cyanideladened mine tailings were dumped into Pinon Creek, a tributary of the Yankee Fork and its habitat for the endangered chinook salmon.

The spill occurred as adult salmon were migrating into the area to spawn.

Hecla officials notified the state, and Department of Fish and Game conservation officers determined that the water in the creek had an excessive acidity level with a strong smell of cyanide.

“If anybody had happened to drink that water, it would have been very dangerous,” Fish and Game conservation officer Paul Valcarce said.

The tailings also contained high concentrations of heavy metals including arsenic.

Fish and Game Department officials will test fish in the creek for signs of contamination, Valcarce said.

The latest spill follows a significant cyanide leak last spring in which 23,000 gallons of cyanide solution leaked through the holes in a waste pond liner at an ore mill just downstream from Pinon Creek and only 500 feet from the Yankee Fork.

Both Mebane and Valcarce said they remain concerned about the cumulative effects of the spills, even if they are not disastrous to the fish immediately.

“It’s just another contribution of pollutants to the system,” Mebane said.

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