Abstract |
The Chisman Creek site, located in Southeastern York County, VA, is in a 520-acre sub-watershed of the Chisman Creek coastal Basin on the Virginia Peninsula. As a tidal estuary, Chisman Creek flows easterly into Chesapeake Bay. Chisman Creek supports private and commercial marinas and numerous private docks, and is also a popular fishing area. In 1957 and 1958, two units of the Virginia Power Yorktown Power Generating Station began burning coal mixed with coke from a nearby petroleum refinery. Fly ash was produced by these units until 1974. A private contractor, employed between 1957 and 1974 to haul the fly ash from the generating station, disposed of large quantities of this incinerated coal by-product in four abandoned sand and gravel pits in the Chisman Creek watershed, approximately two miles south of the generating station. No dust control measures were employed during the hauling, and uncontrolled erosion caused fly ash to wash from the pits into Chisman Creek and its tributaries during heavy rains. The primary contaminants of concern include: trace metals (nickel and vanadium), and inorganics. |