Dive summary:
- A smoldering landfill just outside of St. Louis is creeping closer to buried nuclear waste dating back to the Manhattan Project.
- The layer of trash has been burning at the Bridgeton Landfill since 2010, every year inching closer and closer while releasing a noxious odor trapping many inside their homes.
- Officials estimate that the landfill has another ten years before the smoldering hits the nuclear waste and they hope to have more pipelines or other structures built by then to help contain the problem.
From the article:
Just below the surface of the Bridgeton Landfill, a layer of trash has been burning since at least 2010, fueled by an underground reaction of decomposing waste. The smoldering causes a noxious odor so overpowering that people in surrounding neighborhoods are reluctant to come out of their homes. Republic Services, the Phoenix-based owner of Bridgeton, is spending millions of dollars to ease the smell problem.
But the smell is just the most immediate concern. Environmentalists are alarmed by the possibility that the fire could someday reach the nuclear waste in the neighboring West Lake Landfill, owned by a subsidiary of Republic Services....
