Forum: The Liner that couldn't Leak

By Patsy Fritz

When Gregory Canyon Ltd. brags about its technological wonder, the experimental landfill liner that purportedly won't leak, I'm reminded of the technological wonder of a century ago, that other liner that couldn't leak: the luxury steamship liner RMS Titanic.

Quoting Wikipedia, "Titanic was designed by experienced engineers, using some of the most advanced technologies and extensive safety features of its time."

Four days out of Southampton on her maiden voyage to New York, RMS Titanic struck an iceberg on April 14, 1912, that gashed her "unsinkable" hull.

Leaking beyond control, she sank in two hours and 40 minutes. Death toll: 1,517 passengers and crew.

RMS Titanic had complied with every safety regulation and enjoyed an unlimited construction budget, as befits an ultra-luxury liner.

Gregory Canyon's attorney, Bill Morrow, (FORUM, Sept. 21) fails to grasp the danger that his Gregory Canyon dump poses to the vast underground San Luis Rey aquifer that supplies 20 percent of the City of Oceanside's drinking water, and serves homes and farms along Highway 76 as their only water supply.

Who could be so short-sighted as to risk this vast underground reservoir that serves our thirsty county by building a dump over it?

A landfill brings 30 years of profits to its operator, but can destroy the aquifer for eternity.

Aquifers take eons to develop. Water filters through bedrock constantly re-fractured by frequent minor earthquakes along the Elsinore and San Jacinto Faults ---- extensions of the San Andreas.

It is this fractured bedrock, scouring the water of organic material on its long, slow journey from and through the mountains ---- water that fell to earth over a century ago ---- that is now the county's purest water source.

But the San Jacinto is the most active of all Southern California faults, with the most pent-up energy. A major earthquake like the 6.4 that hit Pala at 4:25 a.m. on Christmas 1899, collapsing the massive roof beams of Pala's San Antonio Mission, would rock this landfill.

Can any landfill liner, ravaged by hybrid acid and yet-unknown chemical compounds, stave off deterioration and seismic torquing for centuries?

Toxic leachate from the Gregory Canyon Landfill could ooze into bedrock any time, from decades to centuries from now, a witches' brew liquefied from chemicals, pesticides, plastics, petroleum products, cleaning supplies, paints, mercury, batteries ---- anything a careless public throws in its trash ---- resulting in hazardous compounds unable to be neutralized.

Once that ooze coats the billion individual shards of bedrock, a thousand HazMat-suited workers could not scrub away the chemical scum. When the aquifer is defiled, so is the underground river flowing through it. Once polluted, it becomes a permanent distributor of poisoned water ---- all the way to the ocean.

We should risk this, just so Gregory Canyon Ltd. gets 30 years of profits?

Have we no conscience for future generations' needs?

Remember the leaking Titanic ---- and urge Gov. Brown to protect the San Luis Rey aquifer by signing SB 833. No dumps on California rivers!