Solution mining directly caused the mudboils muddying Onondaga Creek

Evidence

When the salt wells near the factories ran out, Allied Chemical used solution mining to access the underground salt deposits up near the headwaters. The company pumped water into the subterranean deposits, dissolved them away, and then pumped the brine miles down the valley to the Solvay plant. The brine line was run through the remaining territory of the Onondaga Nation, where breaks in the line ruined the well water. Eventually the dissolved salt domes collapsed underground, creating holes through which groundwater pushed with high pressure. The resulting gushers created the mudboils that flow downstream and fill the lake with sediment. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 1162

Categorization

• QUESTION: The elders’ memory and the described mechanism imply corporate causality, which the company denies as an act of God — worth chasing the actual legal/scientific resolution of the mudboil dispute.