By J.D. Capelouto Globe Correspondent June 17, 2016
Thursday started as a normal water testing day for Ian Cooke at the Neponset River Watershed Association — until volunteers in Norwood brought him bottles of toxic red water.
Chemical runoff from Wednesday night’s massive fire at an abandoned warehouse had made its way to Hawes Brook, which leads into the Neponset River, dyeing the water and killing hundreds of fish and birds, environmental investigation crews would later discover.
“At least a million gallons of contaminated water went into the stream,” said Cooke, the executive director of the watershed association. “Because it was not contained initially, there’s really no practical way to recover that.”
The US Environmental Protection Agency and state Department of Environmental Protection are investigating the spill, DEP spokesman Ed Coletta said.
Officials say the runoff originated from barrels of chemicals inside the warehouse on Davis Avenue.
“There are reports that the facility was used for a number of industrial purposes including a tannery, pool chemical storage, and soap/dye manufacturing,” EPA spokeswoman Emily Bender said. “We suspect there are a range of chemicals present in the building.”
The fire was still smoldering Friday morning, Bender said, and the building is structurally unsound and unsafe to enter, making it hard for investigators to examine the barrels of chemicals that poisoned the creek.
Cooke said he walked almost 4 miles Thursday along Hawes Brook to the Neponset, and found dead fish and red water the entire way. There were also two small ponds near the warehouse, both filled with contaminated water and dead fish, Cooke said.
“We’re very sorry to see this happen. The Neponset is a river that had been getting increasingly clean over time. It’s disappointing to see it affected by something like this,” Cooke said. “We’re hopeful that authorities will continue to work on it [and] make sure someone’s held accountable for the situation.”
Cooke acknowledged that the decision of whether to direct the chemicals toward the stream rather than to a sewer is a tough decision, and neither is ideal.
“From our point of view, to put it into a body of water killing fish is an even worse thing,” he said.
Samples from the waterway are expected to come back next week, according to the EPA.