Truck rolls over near Meadowbank mine, spills estimated 20k litres of fuel
Driver is safe, freshwater not yet contaminated, but too early to say the impact of the spill, Agnico Eagle states
A fuel tanker rolled onto the side of an all-weather road near the Meadowbank Mine complex, seen here, on Nov. 28. The driver is safe and a reclamation process has begun for the 20,000-litre spill. (File photo)
A fuel tanker rolled onto its side on an all-weather road near Meadowbank Mine on Monday afternoon, spilling an estimated 20,000 litres of fuel, Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. said in a news release.
The driver was not hurt and an emergency response process began after the report of the crash came in.
Meadowbank Mine is a gold mining complex owned by Agnico Eagle. It’s located 110 kilometres by road from Baker Lake.
No fresh water has been impacted by the spill, according to the release, which cited work done by an emergency and environmental response team.
“They will implement all the measures needed to do the reclamation of the area,” Agnico Eagles spokesperson Casey Paradis St-Onge told Nunatsiaq News.
He added it is too soon to say how long it will take to clean the spill.
St-Onge also said it is too early to say how much the spill will impact Meadowbank Mine’s operations but that employees are still able to go to work.
An investigation is being conducted to look into how the accident happened, Agnico Eagle’s release stated.
Once the spill was reported, Agnico Eagle contacted the federal and territorial government and Kivalliq Inuit Association.
Transport Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Government of Nunavut’s Department of Economic Development and Transportation, as well as the Department of Environment, also did not immediately respond.
Kivalliaq Inuit Association stated it is currently working on a response to the incident.
Gold mining is much more damaging to the environment than iron ore ectraction. Gold mining takes out all the land, uses more water, mercury and cyanide to extract gold. Whereas, iron ore is taken out of land, transferred to the beach and shipped out. I don’t know why Feds, NIRB and GN gives Meadowbank mine get more breaks than Baffinland.
Here we go the anti mining trolls, in their caves and keyboard warriors in their offices, at it again, Aem is the largest private sector employer in Nunavut, we want everybody back on social assistance, so we can look down on them
I entirely support developpement of our Canadian resource not only it creates job for us Inuit and make green people mad,but it also play a role in the world economy as well.
The caribou can drink it all up.
Lots of racism too at that mine, I got better treatment at baffinland got trained right away there but at agnico eagle I never went anywhere no matter how hard I worked, plus at baffinland we got to speak our own language not like agnico where we would get a warning for speaking during work
If this is happenning, outright, it must be reported,most of those southern employees, have no idea who’s backyard they are in. Try that in Quebec, if in fact it is happening.
There was an agreement between AEM and an Inuit organization that the operational language at Meadowbank would be English.
Francophones at Meadowbank get chastised too for speaking French during work.
There are Trade Schools across Canada you can enroll in.
Any way this could be saved for Iqaluit’s drinking water? Heard they are running low…