Environment

Detroit River industrial dock collapse brings $60,000 state fine

October 13, 2020, 8:01 AM

A construction materials supplier that illegally stored limestone aggregate along the Detroit River is fined $60,000 by the state after a partial collapse into the waterway last fall.

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The cleanup site off West Jefferson Avenue. (Photos: EGLE)

The Revere Dock firm, which must pay the penalty by Oct. 17, also accepts a cleanup agreement with the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) .

"They still need to remove the aggregate material that's in the river," an agency spokesman tells Michigan Radio. "So they need to make sure they have some protections in place so they can dredge that material out of the river." 

About 200 feet of dock slipped Nov. 26 at the Detroit Bulk Storage site, 5851 W. Jefferson Ave., sending asphalt, stee, concrete and aggregate into the water.

Cleanup work must be done by next July, the environmental regulators say in a release.

The fines are compensation for the cost of investigation and enforcement activities and violating the Water Resources Protection and Inland Lakes and Streams sections of the Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act (NREPA). 


November's collapse is at center-right.

The consent agreement cites four alleged violations of that 1994 state law:

  • Discharging a substance into the waters of the state that is or may become injurious to the public, animals or fish

  • Unlawful occupation and filling of floodplain and stream channel

  • Violations of due care responsibilities

  • Filling of Detroit River bottomlands without a permit

Uranium roads had been made for the U.S. Defense Department decades ago at the riverside the site by Revere Copper and Brass Co, but tests showed no abnormal radiation after the 2019 collapse.



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