Spill no danger to water council

A spill of an estimated 120,000 gallons of slurry into a river in west Cork had not posed any danger to domestic water supplies…

A spill of an estimated 120,000 gallons of slurry into a river in west Cork had not posed any danger to domestic water supplies or fish, a senior spokesman for Cork County Council said yesterday evening.

Mr Brendan Devlin, the Cork County Engineer, said the slurry spill had occurred on the Bridewell River, a tributary of the Bandon River, which flows through Bandon in Co Cork, but that there was no immediate danger to drinking water or to flora and fauna.

Despite this, he said the water supply intake near Bandon had been turned off and would remain closed until later this morning. Mr Devlin said there had not been any reports of fish kills and he added that reserves of water in Bandon were adequate to deal with all needs.

It is understood that the South-Western Regional Fisheries Board has identified the polluter.