A Brief History of: The Baia Mare Dam Disaster (Short Documentary)

#BaiaMare #Cyanide #Disaster
Today we are looking at the 2000 Baia Mare Cyanide spill, which resulted from a Dam failure at a gold reclamation facility.
The release of Cyanide from the Romanian tailing pond resulted in an ecological disaster that has been compared to the Chernobyl reactor meltdown in 1986.
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Photos
© Greenpeace / Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert
© Greenpeace / Alfredo Jagendorfer
By Photo: Délmagyarország/Karnok Csaba - www.delmagyar.h..., CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikime...
By Țetcu Mircea Rareș - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, commons.wikime...
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By Derzsi Elekes Andor - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikime...

[@aSinisterKiid]

Ah yes let's put a giant pond of horrendously dangerous chemicals right near the river that travels through multiple countries. Nothing to worry about here. Nobody ever makes a mistake on shift change.

[@robertforrest7956]

Just like Oil pipes running through or under rivers and streams.... guaranteed to leak, and they did!

[@neilkurzman4907]

This wasn’t even a mistake on a shift change. This was something they could’ve dealt with over several weeks.

[@WardyLion]

What could possibly go wrong?

[@aSinisterKiid]

@@neilkurzman4907 i know, it was more of a running joke on this channel as quite a few of the nuclear reactor meltdowns have happened because of a problem of miscommunication on shift change

[@purplefood1]

@@neilkurzman4907 The issue was they were still apparently following the law which really goes to tell you what companies would get away with if they were allowed to.

[@buxomant]

Wow, was not expecting to see my home town mentioned in one of these videos. I remember being around 10 years old at the time when this happened, all the local newspapers were covering it on the front page, but I had no idea how big a deal it was. The tiny river that runs through town (Sasar) was well known for heavy pollution since time immemorial, so I figured it was par for the course (i.e. "we killed the ecosystem... again"). From what I could glean from my parents, this area was booming during the forced industrialization enacted by the communist government. Many people are just first or second generation "city folk", as they (my parents included) moved from the surrounding villages to Baia Mare to find work (mining & related activities were fairly lucrative). Unemployment skyrocketed in the 90s, as pretty much all industry collapsed with the fall of communism. So I can (sadly) understand why people working on this project were just happy to be employed and didn't rock the boat much at the time. Also, as someone else pointed out "Baia Mare" = "big bath", but apparently the word "baia" also used to mean "mine", so the town was basically called "Big Mine". This is also why there are other similarly named towns in the area, e.g. Baia Borsa = Borsa Mine).

[@TheLtVoss]

Nice to read same firsthand experience of a so big disaster here u have earned the 100th like

[@mikeylama]

the original name of that city was also Big Mine, so it makes sense to call it like that today as well.

[@Kece89]

I was also about 10 years old at the time. My father was working as a fisherman in south-eastern Hungary. I still remember him and others working day and night on the spawn rescue operations, trying to beat the cyanide contamination approaching the region. Edit: LOL just noticed him in one of the pictures XD

[@charliecash8661]

​@@mikeylama Nagybánya? It's the same name but in another language. The original name of the town was Rivuli Dominarum.

[@Jfjs58-g]

In Moldova-RO baia means bath. I always thought baia mare as a big bath 🤣

[@hateexmachina]

An Epilogue: The directors of Esmerelda Explorations - the Australian company responsible for operations at the site - placed the company into voluntary administration six weeks after the incident, and to my knowledge never paid a penny in compensation to the affected nations, leaving tax-payers to foot the bill for the clean-up. Brett Montgomery, Esmeraldas chief executive, continues to maintain that there is no evidence the massive leakage of cyanide into natural waterways was responsible for the subsequent ecological damage. Despite this claimed innocence, he has nevertheless scrubbed all mention of Esmerelda from his CV. He continues to harm our environment and destroy habitats to this day, in his current role as non-executive director of Tanami Gold NL, where he is no doubt very generously remunerated. He probably sleeps very soundly at night, and thinks little, if at all, of Baia Mare.

[@hardrays]

thanks for this. amazing that these executives can just start over like its a game.

[@clancyjames585]

@@hardrays Australia is particularly bad this way. Our politicians are so in bed with the mining industry they're even over-writing our own environmental regulations to allow coal mines to pollute the Great Barrier Reef. TBH we should probably lynch them. Instead - she'll be right mate!

[@planescaped]

@@clancyjames585 If only it were so easy...

[@HappyBeezerStudios]

sounds like the kind of person in need of a lead and cyanide dinner

[@haro_yemon]

People calling movie and show villains unrealistic or that they woupdnt get away with it in the real world. Meanwhile in the real world stuff like this happens all the time

[@MarcoZ1ITA1]

Merry Christmas. You've quickly become one of my favorites on this platform, here's to more years of great content.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!!

[@3rdalbum]

Considering the channel is about industrial and nuclear disasters, I always hope he runs out of content very soon.

[@KrooTon]

Agree with both these folks - keep up the great work!

[@derbruzzler7574]

@@3rdalbum That wont happen any time soon i guess.....

[@helheals]

I absolutely love the little speech bubbles you write throughout the video

[@thedon378]

”IAN : BAIAA MAREEE” hits diferent now

[@paultal]

Lol. Daaa

[@jlu3ai]

First of all, thanks for this video. I never knew the exact details of the incident itself in Romania. I was a kid, when this happened, and I can still remember the news reports about filling up huge containers with dead fish, the devastating prospects of a dead river and the long time it would take for the ecosystem to bounce back. Then years later the news reports of a miraculous bounce back years before the forecasted time. (Although I am not sure how much of it is true, on in what degree.) In Hungarian this event is called the 'Tisza Cyanide Pollution'.

[@lukehoward3487]

Great work on educating people on important events that just don’t get the coverage they need and deserve. Thank you.

[@KarlBunker]

That's the cutest cyanide molecule I've ever seen.

[@Terri_MacKay]

"I guess I'm scary." 🤗

[@burneraccount8505]

Wait.......... you've ever seen?????

[@mrnice4434]

give it a nice hug ;P

[@marc-andreservant201]

Cyanide isn't even that bad compared to a lot of other poisons like strychnine or sarin nerve gas. It is actually useful for chemical engineering and mining, so a lot more people work with cyanide than with, say, ricin. Obviously it's still bad. Don't drink cyanide. Only Cody can do that semi-safely.

[@Tser]

I remember how ridiculous the company was in denying the disaster, and that they were not responsible for the environmental devastation. It was absolutely mind-boggling and horrific to watch as people's lives were destroyed, animals were dying by the *hundreds of tons*, tests showed the concentration of cyanide, and the company tried to lie their way out of it.

[@rabbit0664]

Unfortunately that's not uncommon for some companies. Deny, deny, deny.

[@mommachupacabra]

Look into the uranium tailings mortar contamination in East Lansdowne, PA in the early 2000's. That was entertaining - my boss lived there and was worried she and her disabled kids would be forced to relocate by the EPA. Especially how it was discovered, which involved a worker at the Limerick Nuke Plant. Fun times.

[@itsdag6720]

If we are already talking about Hungary, why not make a video of the Ajka red mud disaster. It is also a tailing dam rupture that has affected the watershed of the Danube as well as causing harm to a lot of people. There are some English sources on the mater, but I'm sure that we can get some translations.

[@whatevernamegoeshere3644]

I would gladly translate sources. I can't financially support the channel rn but I wouldn't mind giving in some free work

[@gh0stwolfjr]

I also wanted to recommend this, and I can also translate if necessary

[@gabbyn978]

Mud spills seem to be a hallmark of badly managed mine companies. I remember even more cases, one in Spain (Los Frailes on April 25th, 1998 which ran right into a water fowl preservation area) and not too long ago the Rio Doce (sweet river) disaster near Benito Rodrigues (November 5th, 2015) followed by the Brunadinho incident (January 25th, 2019), both being caused by the same mining corporation.

[@tislerlevente6767]

I also recommend this event. I even have personal experiences a few days after the accident and would gladly share them.

[@lestupidunicorn]

was about to suggest the same, good one

[@ReverendTed]

Since I was curious as he described the concentrations per L of water at different points, the average lethal dose of cyanide is about 50-200mg. At the strongest concentration described of 19mg/L, a small person would need to drink about 2.5L of water to receive a lethal dose.

[@cageybee7221]

sure, but if you relied on fish to live, you die regardless.

[@AnalystPrime]

So less than the amount of water average person drinks over 1 to 3 days. Also, the water would be used for cooking, bathing and washing so the cyanide is on their food, skin and clothes and gets eaten or absorbed that way.

[@wiretamer5710]

the cyanide molicule is so small it can penitrate any tissue and it is impossible to brake down. It destroys a living cells ability to absorb 'food' so the hoast animal dies on a celular level. A molicule of cyanide can continue to kill cell after cell without loosing its potentcy. Cyanide poisoning is a dangerous variable at any level because the chemistry of cyanide does not decay. Unfortunately the only way a body has of excreating cyanide is through the kidneys which inevitably take a beating along the way.

[@LoneWolf-wp9dn]

that would be normal water intake for a day

[@Per_TP]

I don't know why I have a big interest to read about disasters that have happened in the history. You describe them very well with a voice that is easy to listen to. Keep up the good work!

[@shadowblade5018]

BREAKE THE ICE ON THE RIVERS!!!! THE FISH ARE DROWNING!!!!!!

[@samuelfellows6923]

🤨

[@caninecurry5823]

Save the fishes

[@alexandrub8786]

@orinoco sula the australian company chairman told that the fish drowned because they had no air/oxygen.

[@vladd415]

Wouldn't it be suffocating?

[@srrj9358]

@@alexandrub8786 to cover the disaster, of course. They had some interest in that plan.. all of this because of coruption.

[@serbang277]

A Romanian myself, and it is the 1st time I hear of this. I was aged 6 at that time but nonetheless it is weird that no info resurfaces regarding this.

[@PHelsing]

baia mare=The big bath 😂😂 This is why we protested for years and years. In order to stop any further mining here and at Rosia Montana (a similar case and site) Please check that too when you have time

[@calinboitor6623]

translates to big mine,dumb-ass

[@PHelsing]

@Robbo's Modern Life the fact that Calin^ got offended out of nothing

[@willmcconnell6008]

@Robbo's Modern Life he's probably putting laughing faces because the translation to big bath is ironic, not because the disaster was funny

[@matarosie7170]

@@willmcconnell6008 Baia has two meanings in romanian, and here it means mine, so Baia Mare is The Big Mine

[@PHelsing]

@@willmcconnell6008 bingo .. someone got it...and the name is appropriate,,,, since the whole thing is a shit show.

[@Vampire296099]

Woow I'm from România and did not know about this. Imagine my reaction here you speaking the name. Cheers m8 from that country

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!

[@stevencroat]

Wow, Im from Hungary, and everyone has terrible memories from that time...

[@anthonydefreitas6006]

This cover up policy must be a common thing in ex soviet union countries. I have a Lithuanian friend who knew nothing of the Cuban missile crisis.

[@bigwendigo2253]

@@anthonydefreitas6006 shit man we have Americans that don’t even know what that is

[@laszlokantor5895]

@@anthonydefreitas6006 You don’t even know that Romania was never part of the USSR.

[@micultimy91]

Been to Baia Mare last year. That city is so... grey even after mining operations stopped for good. Most of the people fled to UK or Spain to find better paid jobs and also a better life. There are a lot of closed mines in the surrounding area and ruins of buildings everywhere. Also, there's a 256+m tall chimney in the former industrial area that was used to blow away the highly toxic particles produced by the activities around. That disaster you just presented was the beginning of the end of Baia Mare gold and silver extraction operations and it was basically a social and economic disaster. Thanks for the video. Greetings from Romania 🇷🇴

[@ekv]

As a Serbian I remember this. I was a kid 5-6 y old, and it was a big deal, we didn't had drinking water for days. Now I finally know why :"D

[@RoRo0490]

Of course 😂😂😂😂

[@arionerron4273]

Me looking at the thumbnail: "oh that's a shallow dam, how did that kill anyone... Oh wait it's poison isn't it, oh fuck it's gonna be poison"

[@jaykace5160]

Its plainly difficult to Express how I feel when I get a notification about a new video. Keep up the amazing work!

[@driftnut753]

I can't believe Dave would just lie like that. FFS Dave.

[@CristianZ-KRS]

''DOREL'' would have been a much better chosen name

[@mommachupacabra]

My big brother is a Dave. I have mixed feelings about this as "FFS Dave!" Has been known to pass my lips on many occasions.

[@neuralmute]

I have a cactus named Dave. He's a great cactus. But I wouldn't put him in charge of anything but being a cactus. I have no idea why he was hired for this job.

[@matthewrichardson2467]

It was the same Dave who said it was only 3 roentgen...

[@cris_261]

Dammit Dave! ;^)

[@baxmauer]

Rammstein wrote the song "Donau Kinder" about this disaster

[@neuralmute]

Thanks for the reminder that I haven't been listening to enough Rammstein lately!

[@mlyvmstdie3017]

I was wondering if this was about the same thing... Thanks for the confirmation 👍

[@deprivedoftrance]

I thought that was about the contamination of the Techa?

[@vaclav_fejt]

Did they also write a song about the 1988 Ramstein disaster? Or did they just took their name from that?

[@brylozketrzyn]

@@vaclav_fejt band name is derived both from accident at military base and as german version of "The Rolling Stones". Of course there is their song about this accident

[@whatevernamegoeshere3644]

Thank you so much for making this!

[@sarjim4381]

These kinds of tailing dam ruptures have happened many times in the past. This was just one of the biggest of them and affected the most countries. Tailings dams are a necessary part of mining, but we need much better oversight and regulation of them to stop this kind of disaster in the future.

[@VitoDRF]

We need less environmentally risky methods to refine the ores. And they exist, the yield is just slightly lower.

[@markrice41]

I had never heard of this one before. Thank you for sharing it.

[@emberklavins9567]

You know shit is about to get real when he says a specific date and time

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Dam and Cyanide (if any) puns below please 👇

[@hk5716]

wut

[@Lazy_Tim]

Dam cyanide salts. Dammit!

[@LittleGrandpaSimpson]

Don't cyanide excited to see what we come up with.

[@thejudgmentalcat]

Wife: I want to kill my hubby and spend all his money Also wife: You must stay hydrated! Drink this...all of it...there's a good boy.

[@thejudgmentalcat]

@Slap Happy I don't understand it either, but it happens all over the world. People are nasty.

[@mlyvmstdie3017]

Your channel is such a significant part of my psyche that when I read a news article about an industrial disaster or the like, I think "this would be a good topic for a Plainly Difficult video" :)

[@magencrisis1682]

this morning I read about 850 tanks containing chlorine gas that went missing in my country and I thought "shit, this better not become a topic for a Plainly Difficult video"

[@blondknight99]

Does "You stepped on my foot" guy not work in Romania?

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Unfortunately not

[@volo870]

@@PlainlyDifficult I thought they were overwhelmed by the flags welter.

[@sepsialexandru899]

Wow I'm from Baia Mare and I'd never thought I would see the name of my city on a semi-popular youtube channel!

[@jacobconner7147]

I love your channel. Such real life horror is oddly fascinating. Every video is also a good reminder to never take shortcuts whenever you do anything because it could lead to disastrous results.

[@floydthedroid5935]

Your channel is quite simply, excellent.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!

[@enhaxed7839]

What a bunch of cowboys, that was ridiculous. You can get away with huge open leach ponds in Australia out in the country because the populations are super low, stick one in the middle of Europe? WTF? Some of the highest population densities on earth? And of course they appear to have never dealt with snow and underestimated the effects. Just mad.

[@mabamabam]

You cant get away with poorly engineered leach heaps in Australia because environmental laws dont allow it. Australia has highly developed mining industry which means highly developed regulations. It is small countries without the same expertise in creating and enforcing mining regulations where these things happen. Or Brazil i suppose, but thats more corruption than incompetence.

[@tybofborg]

@@mabamabam You can get away with Australian mining companies blowing up Aboriginal historical sites though, because poor people never get a say. And that's also why Australian mining companies can get away with sticking poorly engineered leach heaps in Romania.

[@mabamabam]

@@tybofborg yep. Most businesses are just a bunch of cunts. They need laws telling them not to kill their own grandma. The schoolyard "no one said I couldn't" becomes "we complied with all relevant legislation"

[@John-ym9ht]

Astonishing how ugly the results of greed are.

[@fujikawu]

Another great video from you!!!! i freaking love your channel mate. Very informative!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!

[@wanderinghistorian]

"Hey...how much cyanide is lethal?" "About 200mg give or take. Why how much did you lose?" ".......115* tons." *corrected number, thanks to commentors who caught my error!

[@ethanlai1044]

Oops

[@queenjayisokay1989]

It was in this moment he knew......... He fucked up

[@NecromancyForKids]

115 tons, in fact.

[@whatevernamegoeshere3644]

They lost 115 tons. Lethal dose can be as low as 80-100mg. They lost enough cyanide to kill 1.15M people

[@johnpekkala6941]

@@whatevernamegoeshere3644 Amazing that no people got killed indeed although the carnage along the way was really dreadful still.

[@paststeve1]

ANOTHER great offering from Plainly Difficult. I'm wondering if future floods downstream would re-agitate the settled effluent along the various rivers back into the water systems and environment.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you! I wouldn’t be surprised if it did dislodge but future water flow

[@a.b.8606]

Kuwait Oil Fires ,one of the worst natural disaster of the 90s , your commentary on it would be sublime

[@henkblignault8255]

Hi, have a look at Merriespruit tailings facility in South Africa... love your videos.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you for the suggestion

[@bencesanta2191]

Marry Christmas! You have improved a lot over the years. I always enjoy watchig Your videos. Educational, informative and objective contet is always great. I lived through this as a kid as I grew up near the Tisza. It was horrific to see the river, dead animals everywhere, fishermans struggeling, even the plants were dying and looked terrible for years. It was really sad. A suggestion for a future video maybe: 2010 Hungarian Red Sludge disaster. Would be nice to see that one too from an other perspective, not just as a Hungarian. Cheers, and keep up the good work!

[@mogeking56]

Greed outweighs life, health and respect ✊🏾

[@user-lk6mo5fm1l]

I look forward to your videos so much !! Keep it up man !!

[@jasongeorgeoff4626]

Thank you for the videos man. Merry Christmas to you and your family. Great content, Ive always wondered about the topics you make videos on. Bit didn't know how to research it. Keep them coming

[@thedamntrain5481]

I live in this city, it becomes just like in gta 3 days ago, someone crashes hes car into a bridge, 2 days ago a guy ran over 2 people with a van at 100kmh and then hit a taxi. When police came, in the same spot, a bmw driver hit the car in front of him, in that night, a guy stole a volvo fh 16 460hp truck from sighet, driving 90km with it into Baia Mare, trashing a car into a ditch, 20 shots were fired, and now this is in my recommendations Sasar became very clean now, ducks are swiming in it, people throw bread to those ducks

[@adamdavis4690]

Mount Polley tailings pond failure in Canada might be right up your alley! Thank you for your videos

[@kascia5380]

Rammstein made a song about it, "Donaukinder"

[@cameronjenkins6748]

Wo sind die kinder? That part of the song plays through my head whenever there is a disaster involving river pollution on this channel.

[@JodieBarbwireHeart]

Was just coming to comment this! Especially since the Danube (or danau in Germany) runs through many countries - I was lucky enough to visit Budapest a few years ago and fishing on the river itself has gone way way down since this!

[@bsadewitz]

I'm delighted you're making videos again. I really dig your slightly peculiar aesthetic. ;-)

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you kindly!

[@jwenting]

With a choice of cyanide or mercury to dissolve gold, not much to choose from if things go wrong...

[@Dennis-vh8tz]

And cyanide is probably the safer alternative. It at least breaks down relatively quickly in the evironment; whereas; mercury lingers virtually forever... A pool of mercury would contaminate the local area even if nothing went wrong, and a spill would have left the surrounding area severly contaminated for the foreseeable future.

[@locklear308]

As I've said dozens of time, DIRT IS NOT A MATERIAL FOR REAL DAMS! Good god

[@JonnyMac420]

I agree with MarcoZ, great work. Please don’t stop

[@planescaped]

I am amazed there is any wildlife left in Europe's forests, mountains and rivers honestly with how much that continent has murdered the land over the millennia.

[@romanvarcolac2238]

I hate modern society with so much technological development that leads to all these ecological disasters. It’s not like we already are so populace that we have displaced many species to extinction, but we also poison vast water sources in addition. In my opinion we should not be refining nature to this extent. Anyways, even as a Romanian-American, I did grit my teeth a bit at hearing Baia Mare pronounced like that, but it’s all good my friend, I probably couldn’t pronounce many foreign names well either. Great video on such a large tragedy and I wish you a great new year!

[@scaredandconfused9685]

Great timing, just a few weeks after a spill of cyanide in the Bečva river in the Czech republic (which was just the most recent in a series of toxic spills that started in autumn)

[@JonsTunes]

My guess from your picture wasn't a million miles away: Rosia Montana Romania

[@justgonnagetbetter1037]

Hey, my guess was actually close! Great vid as usual! Thanks!

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!

[@piritskenyer]

I remember that from when I was a kid. It was pretty weird living some 600 km down river on the Tisza, in the town of Szeged, and having fish washed up on the riverbank. I didn't really understand at the time what really happened, other than it was bad for wildlife.

[@nerobernardino88]

real bad for wildlife

[@8MoonsOfJupiter]

Thankyou for sharing this - I'd never even heard of this spill before (I was overseas when it happened) so it was shock to me to hear this was the 2nd worst environmental disaster in Europe!

[@Aq5CiQRkiq]

My god, I studied this for my Geography course! This is going to be a blast from the past!

[@travelcuciuperca1223]

I am from Baia Mare and I didn’t know all of this 😅 maybe because I was 3 years old but still

[@masonmunkey6136]

Could you look into some oil spill disasters? It doesn’t seem like there are many on specific events on youtube.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thanks for the suggestion

[@cris_261]

The cartoon guy with one foot on the pipe and one foot in space clearly sums it up: "this sucks!"

[@psylantwolf]

-a someone who works in mining in the United States, I can say that leaching of gold using cyanide can be done safely, but it did take the industry a long time to get there. It seems like most of the spills in the US were related to leakage through the protective, supposedly impermeable sheets under leach piles. It took years of research and study to discover the problem wasn't defects in the plastic sheets themselves. The construction workers who would lay out the sheets were usually smokers, and holes were being melted through the sheets while they were being installed via discarded cigarettes. We need mining, but it needs to be done safely and responsibly. I do think cyanide can be used safely, but measures need to be in place to "account for the human element."

[@lebitelexie9350]

I was in elementary school when this went down. The news were filled each day with mournful fishermen dragging out hundreds of kilograms of dead fish from the water. Living rather close to the Romanian border AND the Tisza river, people were worried that our drinking water will be contaminated. Jokes about the "Tisza fishermen's soup" beeing poisonous was a recurring joke for long years to come. But with all jokes aside, it was damn sad to see the pictures and videos about the river carrying dozens and dozens of dead fishes.

[@gumpyoldbugger6944]

Here in my home Province of BC we had a similar event, The Mount Polley Mine Disaster where a poorly maintained tailing pond fail and caused massive ecological damage. During the investigation, a massive amount of of mismanagement was found at the company along with the Provincial Government of Cristie Clarke turning a blind eye to reports of problems there.......

[@mari.27]

Ty for this video :))

[@paulleakeii6388]

Perhaps instead of ponds the more expensive many seperate tanks should be used like what we see used to store petroleum products. Any thoughts?

[@naglma]

I love Plainly Difficult. Merrry Lovesmas!

[@thedrunkenrebel]

I`m from that town and i`m in my 20s. When my parents were kids, the pollution from those heavy metal plants was so dense that people`s clothes were shattered on the streets as they walked because of the metal particles. That`s why they`ve built the 3rd tallest chimney in Europe. To this day, traces of heavy metals can be found in the vegetables cultivated on an area of around 10-25km around the main town, depending on how the wind blew the particles around and whether or not the peasants brought dirt from somewhere else to makeover their fields. As far as i`ve read, the cyanide spill would`ve been good if left on its own devices. A very bad thing, but eventually would clear itself. Adding extra chemicals to neutralize it was the thing that turned a serious issue into a catastrophe. One of my university teachers told the class a story of when the gold operations were set to start and the first batch of gold was produced, the communist party staged a massive public appearance for the news. The harvest was put into 2 buckets and the plan was for the minister of natural resources to lift the buckets and praise them or something. Gold is 13x heavier than water, thus those buckets were around 150kg each, and the entire thing was a disaster and needed a 2nd take.

[@adamlove706]

Nice 🥰 Thanks Plainly Difficult

[@liliace5]

I was 9, when this happened, but I don't remember a thing about it. You could also talk about Romplumb (I have a friend who used to work there), the copper smelter of Baia Mare (it wasn't built tall enough and all that sweet sweet smoke fell right onto Baia Mare), the smelters in Ferneziu (I learned about this in university in Natural Sciences and some of the professors were doing research on the soil). Sure, they didn't end up in the news, but they did destroy our air, waters, soil (mostly the quality of the soil) etc for years and years...not to mention all the health implications it had on people. Wildlife is slowly starting to reappear in Sasar River...fish are coming back, wild ducks....last year some beavers were spotted as well. The Ferneziu Dam is also a disaster waiting to happen. If the Dam was to break, Baia Mare would be under water....I remember we used to have evacuation practices in school.

[@stenbak88]

I will never comprehend just adding height to a dam, every time it ends horribly

[@stevejones9062]

" not great , not terrible " to quote the other disaster mentioned. As always profit before safety; and using the excuse " we were operating inside the guidelines "

[@hauntedshadowslegacy2826]

For those who want to prevent more cyanide mining disasters, there's a current event unfolding in California that needs attention and action. Cerro Gordo, an abandoned mining town in the picturesque desert mountains beyond Los Angeles is under threat of ecological destruction. A mining company based in Canada has purchased land around the Cerro Gordo property and plans on pit-mining for gold. There's only a few days left for public comment. The owner of Cerro Gordo is already doing everything he can. Spread the word, and we may be able to get the California Bureau of Land Management to deny the mining project. There are rare Joshua trees in the area and lots of history, with Cerro Gordo and its neighboring abandoned mines being the keystone in Los Angeles' formation. The area is beautiful. You can see it and hear more about it on the owner's channel, Ghost Town Living.

[@madspoulsen4243]

I like them videos. Especially the text bubbles. I wish they last a little longer because it's hard to read before they disappear.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Thank you!

[@moderneducationalstandard]

I'm Romanian and I didn't knew about this.

[@Jackson_M5]

Literally how? Thats like an American not knowing about WWIII.

[@aaronyandell2929]

It's interesting to note that in many of these stories thier is at least that one person who hands waves the dangers. "C'mon. It's no big deal. You worry too much." You know the type.

[@Mehrunes86]

Another great video. Would be cool, if you could a video about the Danish Firework accident in 2004, might not be as exciting only one fireman died, but we got a mushroomcloud.

[@prasakmanitou4925]

Cool, I've never heard of this spills, only more recent Hungarian Ajka alumina plant accident in 2010

[@Dusty_Peanuts]

On the topic of dams you should cover the St. Francis Dam Disaster. I live really close by it so it'd be cool to see some hometown history

[@VandalBeats]

Damn, I never expected to see a video about my hometown, on a fairly popular KZbin channel, recommended to me at 1:20am

[@JoshuaC923]

Wow that chairman needs to be locked away for good

[@TheNasaDude]

Sentence him to take a bath in the pool that broke

[@CesarinPillinGaming]

Almost every single chairman in existence that has made horrible catastrophic damage via an avoidable accident (because cost cuts, shoddy security etc..) behave the same.

[@snikrepak]

Force them to drink the water. It's not that difficult really. For all of the people hurt, animals dead, make these so called big wigs drink thier product!

[@commodoresixfour7478]

Cyanide is also used for testing dissolved heavy metal in water. I used to use a small amount every day at my job.

[@normaselagianu8249]

I am from Baia Mare!

[@libitinasboreed]

I never thought i would see romania in one of your videos. Looks like i was wrong, but good video!

[@annakeye]

This part of the comment section thinks it is about fracking time we stopped allowing politicians and other bureaucrats to lie with impunity. If they were constantly and quickly challenged, and there were consequences to said dishonesty, they may think twice about choosing this type of public service. There's more of us than them and they only do this because we let them away with it. Time-and-time again. *PS: Happy 2021 to my Plainly Difficult fellow and all that appreciate his efforts*

[@Paradox460_yt]

Would love to see a plainly difficult on the Cerro Grande fire. It didn't kill anyone, but caused a lot of damage to the Los Alamos lab

[@decebalruben7056]

I live in Baia Mare for 9 years now and i never knew about this. Damn that must've been bad

[@Rx7man]

Might also be interested in the Mount Polley dam disaster a few years ago in BC, Canada

[@TrinityAlex]

F me, my hometown is 60 km north of Baia Mare, right next to the Tisa river... I had no idea it was this bad...

[@honeymoon618]

Born and raised in Baia Mare and never knew about this didaster, we used to baith in the Lapus river at around 2005 up to 2011. By the way, Baia Mare comes from the Hungarian name "Nagy bánya" and that means "big mine"😊

[@paulzapodeanu9407]

Wow, I'm Romanian and was 14 at the time, admittedly in a region that was not affected, but I have no recollection of this event. I had no idea we caused the biggest disaster in Europe after Chernobyl. Likely because we mostly fucked up our neighbors, seems the impact in Romania was minor. Let me guess, greedy corporations, bribes and little government oversight?

[@kaus623]

Well, KZbin know that I am from Baia Mare, so it recommended me the video xD very nice

[@raulrus9026]

Salut, și eu

[@TheTrueMichael]

Also as from Baia Mare- It's not a small city, it's actually the municipality of the Maramureș county, which means biggest city in the county, which also means we're quite a big town

[@TheTrueMichael]

@@moscuadelendaest that is true but to think area wise...

[@benjaminmcclatchey9814]

You should do one on the Taum Suak dam disaster.

[@synapse349]

Has there ever been one that rated 9 on the Plainly Difficult Disaster Scale?

[@stanislavkostarnov2157]

I think when he did Bhopal...

[@SupersuMC]

@@stanislavkostarnov2157 Out of curiosity: How bad does it have to be to warrant a 9?

[@stanislavkostarnov2157]

@@SupersuMC not sure, mass deaths (like in the tens of thousands or on at least a city sized scale) I guess. I am not him, so I cannot KNOW his thinking, but my guess is it will have to set some really grim record in human suffering... pretty sure I saw him do a nine, but it was something like Bhopal or Semi-palatinsk maybe, there also the deaths some say were in the 10s of thousands, as well as geographically significant areas of Irradiation

[@shopliftingcentral]

never expected to see my little town in a youtube video

[@tegrocket]

"Back in the game!!!!" Lmfao

[@Vercixx]

You can see the cyanide processing plant here 47°39'21.7"N 23°32'11.5"E (use street view on gmaps) and just across the road there is a big green field where there used to be an entire hill with a pond of left overs from the mining activities (similar to those a bit to the west you can see in the clip at 01:56) and it did managed to get processed by the plant. It was such a sad site to see when getting in/out of Baia Mare by train, I was very glad when it was removed (though I am very very sorry about the spill). I am from Baia Mare, but in 2000 I was at university in Bucharest. From talking to my parents there was not so much of an impact in Baia Mare itself as the spill was into a river flowing out of Baia Mare. And anyway, as some commentator already said, that river was already polluted from the surrounding mines and Baia Mare used to be one of the most polluted towns in Romania and probably in Europe - with lead and sulfuric acid air pollution from ore processing plants - so people there were used to pollution so there was not much fuss about it in the city itself. The drinking water in the city came from the nearby mountains and it was clean, so no issue there. Luckily things have dramatically changed regarding pollution, the mines closed - I don't know if there is any single one left operating - the processing plants are all closed so there is no air or river pollution. I saw the first ducks on the Sasar river in 2007 or 2008 signaling the river coming back to life. Probably joining the EU in 2007 also helped as higher pollution standards started to apply. Baia Mare means The Big Mine, but to most Romanians it means The Big Bath. The usual Romanian word for mine is "mina" while "baia" is almost never used as a "mine", in fact many if not most Romanians don't even know it also means "mine". The word is probably coming from the Hungarian "banya" meaning "mine" and it is part of the name of many towns in (Greater) Transylvania as the region was ruled by Hungarians for aprox 1000 years.