February 20, 2014

Little Things for West Virginia

The children who live across the street are collecting items for people in West Virginia whose lives have been disrupted by a chemical spill that poisoned their drinking water. The collection is sponsored by their elementary school. They are asking for things like bottled water (of course), cleaning wipes, waterless toothbrushes, paper plates and cups, no-rinse shampoo, and food products that don't require water.
Items We Donated
This project sounds like a good learning experience because the students are not only enjoying a way to help others, but are also seeing how water, which we usually take for granted, is important to protect and how we depend on it for many things, such as drinking, cooking, cleaning, and bathing.

Although the chemical spilled into the Elk River a month ago, many people still don't have water that's clear and palatable. Not much is known about the safety of MCHM, and it has proven difficult to completely flush out from pipes. Some 300,000 people were affected including the population of Charleston, the state capital.

A thoughtful article on remediation is at Green Risks, and a charity accepting Paypal donations is Aurora Lights. I've been following the story with interest because West Virginia is a neighboring state and I've been there many times.

6 comments:

  1. So sad about the spill. I'm glad people are finding ways to help in such a terrible situation. My how we all take safe drinking water for granted.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It is a good way to get kids aware of consequences like that.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It's wonderful that the elementary school is doing this project to help others and to teach the need to be careful about our water supplies. It's a shame that the story of the spill has slipped from much of the news.

    ReplyDelete
  4. We take so many things for granted, clean water being just one of them. This is a good way to teach kids about compassion and helping others too.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks for sharing the project, and all the best for West Virginia to get their water problems solved! http://lauriekazmierczak.com/now-thank-we-all%E2%99%AA/

    ReplyDelete

The View from Squirrel Ridge features thousands of views of the Shenandoah Valley and surrounding area. I post frequently so please visit often.

Your comments are appreciated. If you are responding to a post older than a few days, your comment will be held until we have a chance to approve it. Thanks for your patience!

Sorry, anonymous comments cannot be accepted because of the large number of spam comments that come in that way. Also, links that are ads will be deleted.