Giant Mine mystery waste probe finds not one but two incidents

An investigation into how waste left the toxic Giant Mine site without anyone knowing the contents has uncovered a second recent failure.

Giant, a former gold mine, is the focus of decades-long work to make safe huge amounts of underground arsenic trioxide – a lethal gold roasting byproduct – and remediate the mine’s surface.

Initially, investigators were looking into the suggestion that bags of soil possibly contaminated with arsenic had left the Yellowknife site on October 19 without the right documentation.

Instead, they discovered one event on October 11 and another on October 16 or 17. (October 19 turns out to have been the wrong date.)

Ultimately, their report suggests no hazardous waste ended up anywhere it shouldn’t have – but the incidents amount to “a near miss.”

The report was prepared by Parsons, the contractor that runs the Giant remediation site – a $4-billion project considered one of the most toxic sites in Canada – on behalf of a federally led project team.

Parsons says workers at its site had become “too relaxed” about verifying that waste leaving Giant was properly documented, and some waste had been lying around for long enough that a “loss of information” resulted – people collectively forgot what it was.

The company says all waste leaving the site is now being inspected for the correct documentation and various rounds of training have been completed.

What left Giant and when?

Three companies are involved: Parsons, subcontractor Nahanni Construction, and KBL Environmental, a waste management company contracted to dispose of some waste produced at Giant.

In incident one, on October 11, 10 mega bags of soil left Giant Mine. Only when the bags got to KBL’s facility did anyone write down what they thought was in them, but they overlooked that the waste soil might have been contaminated with arsenic.

The report confirms that the October 11 mystery waste was sent all the way to a landfill in Alberta without anyone knowing with certainty what it was.

That waste is long gone, churned into a landfill owned by Clean Harbors in Ryley, Alberta and deemed “not recoverable” in a report filed by Nahanni Construction. Parsons says KBL tested material thought to be from a similar area at the mine and the results suggest “the soil was likely non-hazardous for arsenic.” According to Parsons, Alberta Environment has since closed its file on the issue.

But within a week, a second incident occurred.

On October 16 or 17, Parsons says 18 more bags of waste left the Giant site without being properly documented.

Later – when alarm bells began to ring about waste management, and as Parsons tried to figure out exactly what had moved where and when – nobody could account for what those 18 bags contained.

“With no documentation and with the person who transported the waste having left off rotation, Parsons did not know what was in the 18 mega bags,” the report states.

Staff from multiple companies needed “several days” to collectively figure out what had actually left Giant Mine. The bags, it turned out, had contained a relatively harmless concrete powder.

Parsons says it was October 25 before site management began to realize waste was leaving without proper documentation. That day, an initial alert was sent to inspectors. The final report took more than a month to arrive.

‘A high-risk task’

Parsons says there are a number of reasons for the failures.

“There was a rush to remove material from site, apparently due to workers going off rotation and pressure from Parsons staff to clean the area before winter shutdown,” the company states of its own employees.

Parsons also says no testing was completed by Nahanni Construction – or requested by KBL – to be sure that waste being labelled non-hazardous was definitely safe.

The company described a “lack of understanding” about waste management protocols among subcontractors’ staff, and said more training was needed.

Nahanni Construction, which set up a five-person investigation team and filed its own report to Parsons in late November, said it recognized the need for more training and that the colour-coding and visual identification of waste at Giant could improve.

“Disposal of hazardous materials is a high-risk task if not completed properly,” Nahanni’s report acknowledged.