Slashdot Mirror

Fair enough, tho w/6 degrees I'm fairly sure the connection could be made.

Ok, let's try Bhopal...? Contamination and peril were already present for the workers, at least two years before the explosion(s) that killed thousands..

"Pollution outside the factory...
In 1977, Union Carbide constructed Solar Evaporation Ponds - covering an area of 14 hectares - 400 metres north of it's factory. The land was acquired by the Department of Industries, Madhya Pradesh government, from five farmers who were paid no compensation. Chemical toxic wastes and by-products were henceforth also dumped at these sites."

Or blood diamonds in SA...?

[Dow purchased Union Carbide after Union Carbide killed tens of thousands of Indian people when a chemical plant in Bhopal released methyl isocyanate]

ivan256 asks: What would you have prefered to happen? Somebody has to end up owning that mess.

• See #2 on this list for correct ownership of Bhopal plant

• Union Carbide Actions Short timeline of the immediate aftermath.

  My Bhopal site has over 200 links if you want more info. Link is in the sig...

• Three Timelines

• Bhopal Timeline From Greenpeace, ends with 2003 actions.

• Union Carbide Actions Short timeline of the immediate aftermath.

• Bhopal: Incident Review Union Carbide Dow Chemical site.

My Bhopal site has over 200 links if you want more info. Link is in the sig...

• Here's a list of technical I put together on Bhopal at my site, listed in my sig. These are very deadly chemicals with effects that linger on and on and on and on...you know Union Carbide became the EverReady before Dow bought them...

  New Exportation of Risk: The Case of Bhopal

• New Bhopal Papers V. Ramana Dhara at Emory University is a nice cource of technical papers including health effects, epidemiology, toxicology and respiratory effects.

• New Chemical Accidents, CHEMICAL SAFETY & SECURITY Environmental Health Watch. A comprehensive page of articles on chemical safety, security and implications since the Bhopal tragedy.

• Toxicological Profiles for Key Pollutants in Bhopal

• The Disaster and Its aftermath: The Hiroshima of the Chemical Industry "Indeed those who died may have been the lucky ones......" Ward Morehouse.

• A child is born... Site not recommended for children.

• Growth Patterns Journal of the American Medical Association (pdf format)

• The $195 Million Discrepancy - Where's The Money Gone?

• Bhopal gas tragedy lives on, 20 years later

• Personal Exposure and Long-Term Health Effects in Survivors of the Union Carbide Disaster at Bhopal

• Lessons Learned? Chemical Plant Safety Since Bhopal

• Chemical Process Safety at a Crossroads

Friday Dec.3rd marks the 20th anniversary of the tragedy in Bhopal, India. Unfortunately, the Bhopal disaster has never ended. It remains one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes of the century.

More than half a million people were exposed to the deadly MIC gases on the night of the accident, 120,000 so badly that they've been left with permanent and debilitating health effects. Blindness, extreme difficulty in breathing, and cancer are common after effects of exposure, and gynecological problems are also rampant. Some women are still waiting for their first period at the age of twenty, while others have as many as four or five per month. Brain damage and birth defects are also common. The after effects of gas exposure have extended to the second and third generations, and few of the victims have access to adequate medical treatment.

The people of Bhopal have endured unimaginable pain and suffering, and will continue to do so until the site is cleaned up (Union Carbide simply packed up and left the site as it was) and is now after 20 years, the chemicals are contaminating local water supplies. Students and other organizations are joining together in the struggle for Bhopal, one of the most beautiful areas of India. I have collected over 200 links to information on the Bhopal tragedy including local actions on the 20th anniversary, humor, Dow/Union Carbide statements, activist groups, news, book reviews, petitions, timelines, photos and videos, case studies and technical papers.

Please visit my site at...

20th Anniversary of Bhopal, India tragedy on December 2/3. 1984

Thanks for your time,

also aswell

Here's a previous slashdot story the Yesmen vs. Dow, Dow vs. Parody.

PS this post was rejected two days ago

Friday Dec.3rd marks the 20th anniversary of the tragedy in Bhopal, India. Unfortunately, the Bhopal disaster has never ended. It remains one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes of the century.

More than half a million people were exposed to the deadly MIC gases on the night of the accident, 120,000 so badly that they've been left with permanent and debilitating health effects. Blindness, extreme difficulty in breathing, and cancer are common after effects of exposure, and gynecological problems are also rampant. Some women are still waiting for their first period at the age of twenty, while others have as many as four or five per month. Brain damage and birth defects are also common. The after effects of gas exposure have extended to the second and third generations, and few of the victims have access to adequate medical treatment.

The people of Bhopal have endured unimaginable pain and suffering, and will continue to do so until the site is cleaned up (Union Carbide simply packed up and left the site as it was) and is now after 20 years, the chemicals are contaminating local water supplies. Students and other organizations are joining together in the struggle for Bhopal, one of the most beautiful areas of India. I have collected over 200 links to information on the Bhopal tragedy including local actions on the 20th anniversary, humor, Dow/Union Carbide statements, activist groups, news, book reviews, petitions, timelines, photos and videos, case studies and technical papers.

Please visit my site at...

20th Anniversary of Bhopal, India tragedy on December 2/3. 1984

Thanks for your time,

also aswell

Here's a previous slashdot story the Yesmen vs. Dow, Dow vs. Parody.

PS this post was rejected two days ago

There is the concept of scapegoating at play here. Do you really thing that Anderson had anything personally to do with the actions that night? Even remotely indirectly it's a big reach.

Internal Union Carbide documents, released in the discovery phase of a civil lawsuit against the company, indicate that he and other executives had been warned by engineers of the poor safety mechanisms. A 1973 document, signed by Anderson himself, notes that the technology that would be used in the Bhopal factory was "unproven." A safety review conducted by Union Carbide experts in 1982 warned of a "serious potential for sizable releases of toxic materials" at the factory.

You can read part of the class action complaint against Anderson here.

...let me point out that compensation was already in the works. Union Carbide paid India $480 million back in 1989 - we can certainly argue about the amount and whether it's enough, but the money was paid. The real problem there is that the Indian government kept most of the money, and didn't distribute it to or use it on behalf of the survivors. Frankly, I don't see much point in paying out any more, so long as the government of India is going to act as a sinkhole and suck down any more money that gets transferred. Sorry, but maybe this time it should be held in trust for the survivors by someone other than Indian bureaucrats.

You must not
have looked very hard.

The bhopal disater is a well documented, widley known example of a horrible environmental disater.
--

Well, that's good if true. But that's not enough. Let's see what Greenpeace says:

The survivors have never received adequate compensation for their debilitating illnesses and even 18 years after the disaster, the polluted site of the abandoned factory, bleeds poisons daily into the groundwater of local residents.

In the criminal proceedings in courts in India, preceding the settlement, UC and members of its senior staff (including Chairman Warren Anderson) refused to appear in court or obey court orders. Warren Anderson and UC were notified as absconders by the court.

This settlement was made without any consultation with the survivors. The survivors petitioned the court against the settlement. The court ruled that the settlement did not remove criminal liability from UC, UCIL and senior staff mentioned in the initial criminal case.

These figures should be compared to $108 million that Monsanto Company was ordered to pay the family of a single chemical worker who died due to benzene exposure or the $2.5 billion offered by Johns Manville Corporation for about 60,000 claimants of injury caused by exposure to asbestos. (5)

As per the current settlement, the average claimant (the gas affected who put in a claim for compensation) receive approximately $300-$500, which in most cases does not pay for medical bills.

...

# Myth. An independent investigation claimed that a disgruntled employee caused the incident.

Reality. Even though UC has had an opportunity in court to provide information on this sabotage theory, originally presented by Arthur D. Little (ADL), and thus resolve the case, it has failed to do so. However, the corporation still promotes this argument. When this theory was proposed in an international seminar, there was widespread condemnation by experts. A safety specialist with the World Bank noted that he "was shocked when [he] heard that ADL people were promoting the "sabotage" theory for Bhopal at the Institution of Chemical Engineers conference in London." (12)

I don't know much about Bhopal so I thought it best to quote directly, but I couldn't let such one-sided bullshit stand unchallenged.

Are you by any chance an astroturfer working for Dow? Maybe you're not, but I wouldn't be terribly surprised if some of the pro-Dow arguments here came from astroturfers.

(If ad homenim arguments can be used against Greenpeace, I don't see why I shouldn't use ad homenim arguments right back!)

I'm just amazed at how much people are getting this wrong. It is not the WHOLE of India that decided to switch to GNU/Linux, but only the state of Madhya Pradesh. Guys, what would you have said if the headline was the American state of Arkansas, has opted to switch to Linux from Microsoft

In case you didn't know, Bhopal has been the site of the world's worst chemical disaster in 1984. A leak from the Union Carbide (an american company) nearby plant has killed and injured thousands of citizens, and the company has denied responsibility for a long time. See here for more info. Somehow, I'm not surprised that they want to avoid the presence of big american companies

Just my two maple-leaved cents

Slight factual update - the death toll from bhopal is currently estimated to be somewhere over 20,000 dead, with 500,000 injured and 120,000 seriously ill.

http://www.bhopal.net/welcome2.html

They didn't go to prison because their CEO did a runner and refuses to go back to India in case he gets his wrists slapped (mind you, the indian government's being pretty lax/corrupt about the whole sad thing too).

v

Legalities are nicities that we all talk about to deal with civilian misbehavior during peacetime. During wartime (I hope I'm not shattering your worldview) groups of people systematically plot to go find groups of other people and commit what would otherwise be called first degree murder - not only without "representation", without even a trial!.

In war zones, enemy combatantants are lucky to be merely detained. In the real (third) world, they are quite often quietly and unceremoniously killed. Only first-world armies such as the US actually follow the Geneva convention.

The thing that really gets me is automatically assuming that the Taliban are terrorists. They were a government that the US was prepared to deal with, and supply money to (search one of the major news sites, it was early september 2001).

Now even if you think the afghans should have handed Bin-Laden over without the US presenting evidence (think if it had been the other way arround, see below), the US invaded.

I can't blame some one for defending their country. If some other country landed troops because GWB refused to hand over a war criminal, would you pick up a gun and defend your country?

Does that make you a war criminal to?

Interesting links. If you want information, search for Union Carbide in you favorite news site

summary of India-US extradition treaty

An article on court procedings. How can some one refuse to be extradited?

Articly critical of the indian governments handeling

"The government, and corporations, are made up of you and I. They are not unthinking, uncaring robots that kidnap old people, puree them in a big blender, and sell them back to you as baby food."

Hah! What colour is the sky in your world?

Here are just two examples: Union Carbide, Bhopal disaster. Ford Motor Company, Pinto.

In the UC case, shoddy plant maintenance and a shocking reduction in staff training -- a cut from six months of training, to a quick two weeks! -- led to a tragic chemical leak that resulted in 20000 deaths, another 120000 people requiring medical treatment, and a generation of grossly deformed children.

United Carbide really gives a flying fuck, don't they?

Ford Motor company built Pintos from 1969 to 1977, fully aware that it would explode on rear impact, because it calculated that the predicted 180 deaths per year directly attributable to this known design defect would be cheaper than spending an additional $11 per car to eliminate the defect.

Ford really gave a flying fuck, didn't it?

Oh, hey, and let's look at one last case: Kerr-McGee corporation, which was a plutonium fuels processing plant. Yah, that'd be plutonium: one of the most deadly elements, lethal in astonishingly small quantities. The plant had some safety control problems. Karen Silkwood started kicking up a fuss.

It's pretty much acknowledged that the head honchos at Kerr-McGee had Karen Silkwood killed for her efforts to protect the workers and community.

"The government, and corporations, are made up of you and I. They are not unthinking, uncaring robots that kidnap old people, puree them in a big blender, and sell them back to you as baby food."

Hell, no. They're unthinking, uncaring robots that spew forty tons of massively toxic, mutagenic chemicals into third-world cities, build cars that explode in a low-speed rear-end collision because it's cheaper that way, and murder employees who might fink them out.

This is the case for example in Africa, where infection rates are astonishing. We are working on a compulsory license application in South Africa. Right now more than half of pregnant women in their 20s are testing positive for HIV. They will all die without access to medicines. What type of government would put the interests of patent owners above the interests of half a generation of mothers?

The US government, and the government of the vast majority of the other industrial countries (actually I don't know any exception).

We should be ashamed when we read things like that (I am, although I knew this before, but I'm ashamed every time I'm reminded to such things). No I'm don't want to justify sep 11 events and I strongly abominate them - and I don't like the urge I feel that it's necessary to assure this in any critical statement nowadays - but we (the "developed" nations) sacrify a lot of lives for out wealth, day to day, year to year.

Go to www.bhopal.org, especially here and here,here or here (I choose one random example here, to add to the drug thingy) and wonder with me why we as western people can yet go to so many countries in the world and be welcomed, while every dark skinned, muslimic looking man in our countries gets looked like he will soon begin to kill people.

The typical theme of critizing the united states for their past politics is far to easy for western citizens. No, we all as a big group of people bear the blame for much of the hatred against us, because of our way of living. We amuse ourselfes on a gigantic pile of nearly world wide misery.

Sorry, this post isn't loaded with facts, sometimes I just get a little depressed and have to rant.