The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "groundwater" ...
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Poison in the Water
“Poison in the Water” is a WNCN investigation that exposes how state government failed to warn families that the water they were drinking could be killing them. Through six weeks of research and digging through hundreds of FOIA documents, WNCN uncovered the source of the contamination in a Wake Forest, N.C. community and revealed state regulators ignored their own evidence of the danger. “Poison in the Water” held the powerful accountable and sparked calls for state legislative change. As a result, national groundwater advocate, Erin Brockovich, visited the Wake Forest families.
Tags: water safety; government; water contamination; groundwater
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"Tainted Water"
For more than 20 years, the harmful chemical perchlorate has seeped into San Bernardino County's groundwater. The seep is thought to have started at a local dump site; however, records about the site were lost in the late 1980s by "two state regulatory agencies." The problem wasn't reported again until 1997, but warnings were "dismissed" by the county. The site was "rediscovered" in 2001, but it wasn't until 2009 that the county got serious about stopping the chemical seep. It is estimated that the cleanup operation will be completed by 2013.
Tags: Perchlorate; Broco facility; Department of Toxic Substances Control; Butch Ariza; Water Board; Barry Groveman
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Hidden Wells, Dirty Water
An investigation into groundwater contamination in the heavily agricultural Lower Yakima Valley found that local, state and federal agencies responsible for clean drinking water and environmental health repeatedly neglected their regulatory duties. This left low-income Latino farm workers exposed to health threats.
Tags: dairy industry; water; agriculture; Latino; contamination; nitrate; wells; environment
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Coincidence or Cluster
"The series examined a series of lawsuits filed since April 2006 that claim that groundwater and air contamination from two neighboring manufacturers caused people in McCullom lake, population 1,000, to get sick with brain cancer and other illnesses."
Tags: cancer; McHenry County Department of Health; law suit; groundwater; contamination; Rohm and Haas Manufacturing Company; Modine Manufacturing company
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Danger Below
This investigation began with citizen complaints about New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation. Many of the complaints concern old toxic waste disposal sites; the agency does not make sure the contaminated groundwater and soil are completely cleaned, nor does the agency communicate with people affected by the sites. The DEC's shortcomings may have stemmed, in part, from its diminished resources and power under the administration of governor George Pataki.
Tags: environment; toxic waste; FOI; EPA; state government; pollution
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Blighted Homeland
During the Cold War, the federal government, seeking to increase its nuclear arsenal, mined uranium on a Navajo reservation that spanned parts of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, with 3.9 million tons of uranium ore chiseled and blasted from the mountains between 1944 to 1986. Fifty years after a medical journal noted an almost complete lack of cancer on the reservation, that mining left a mark that still persists today. The L.A. Times finds that "groundwater is contaminated, gray mine wastes cascade down hillsides and erosion exposes once-buried radiation at reclaimed mines and illegal dump sites." Some Navajos have suffered from lung and breast cancer, attributable to the harsh conditions created by the mining. Now uranium is once again rising in price, and mining companies are preparing to move in again, this time with new technology. But still with environmental consequences.
Tags: Uranium; uranium mining; Navajo reservation; cancer rates; Cold War; environmental effects of mining
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Hidden Hazards: A Legacy of Neglect
Robert McCabe unmasked a failed environmental protection system on the local, state and federal level in Chesapeake, Virginia, that permitted developers to build housing on lands with serious pollution problems. In his first report, McCabe explained how in one subdivision, the lead contamination is so high that home buyers in part of the neighborhood will be forbidden to grow vegetables or to water their lawns with groundwater. Furthermore, their homes sit over an old dump site with high levels of underground combustible gas.
Tags: pollution; Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ); River's Edge at Quailshire; environmental hazards; lead contamination
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Interstate 99: An environmental challenge
This investigation revealed how massive amounts of sulfurous rock, called pyrite, unearthed by road builders threatened to pollute streams and groundwater. Furthermore, the newspaper found that the failure of state road builders and environmental regulators to communicate contributed to faulty decisions, that a decision by road builders which ran counter to design specifications contributed to the problem, and that a decision by former U.S. Rep. Bud Shuster to eliminate federal oversight of the highway construction project eliminated a layer of inspections that could have foreseen the problems.
Tags: groundwater contamination; environmental pollution; highway construction; pyrite; acid rock
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Perchlorate in Lettuce
This investigation showed how a potentially harmful rocket-fuel chemical had contaminated the nation's supply of winter lettuce. Approximately ninety percent of the nation's winter lettuce is grown in the Imperial and Coachella valleys, and is irrigated with Colorado River water. The river is contaminated from a Cold War -era manufacturing plant near Las Vegas that stopped making perchlorate in 1998.
Tags: pollution; chemicals; groundwater
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Not Wet Enough: Even in the most unlikely places, local governments are grappling with demands for water that exceed existing supplies. And conservation isn't turnng out to be easy or cheap.
Many cities with blooming populations expect to suffer from a water shortage in the near future. This article explains how different city governments are preparing to deal with the issue.
Tags: American Water Works Association; AWWA; shortage; drought; groundwater; aquifers