An environmental report issued more that 12 years ago alerted Myrtle Beach officials to the possibility that trichloroethylene was polluting the city's groundwater, but the city apparently never conducted a follow-up investigation to identify the extent or source of that contamination.
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Environmental tests show toxic contamination from AVX Corp. has not made its way to the oceanfront, but three soil samples in a Myrtle Beach neighborhood indicate vapors from the contamination could be seeping into the air, state officials said Tuesday.
S.C. officials told AVX Corp. as long as eight years ago to test for groundwater contamination at property adjacent to the manufacturer's headquarters, but the state backed off after AVX said all contamination from its use of a toxic chemical had been contained on the company's land.
A group of Myrtle Beach residents filed a class-action lawsuit Wednesday against AVX Corp., claiming the electronics manufacturer contaminated their property with a toxic chemical.
The S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control said it has narrowed the strip of land that is contaminated with a toxic chemical that came from the AVX Corp. facility in Myrtle Beach.
Groundwater contamination from the potentially dangerous chemical trichloroethylene has spread through at least a 10-block area of Myrtle Beach, environmental tests show, leading some experts to question whether the public's health might be at risk.
Electronics manufacturer AVX Corp., a suspected source of groundwater contamination in a Myrtle Beach neighborhood, knew since at least 2000 that toxic chemicals had migrated from its 17th Avenue South facility to an adjoining property, according to state documents.
The state's Department of Health and Environmental Control will meet next week with Myrtle Beach residents to discuss toxic contamination in the groundwater near electronics manufacturer AVX Corp.'s facility, the agency said Wednesday.
Toxic contamination at the AVX Corp. facility in Myrtle Beach was kept secret for 26 years, and that has some environmental experts and residents questioning why state regulators never did anything to inform the public about a potential health risk.
Myrtle Beach-based AVX Corp. announced its revenue for the quarter ending Sept. 30 was up 7 percent over the same quarter last year to $400.7 million, according to a Thursday news release.
Electronics manufacturer AVX Corp., a suspected source of environmental contamination in a Myrtle Beach neighborhood, might face new sanctions in a decades-old pollution case that became one of the nation's largest Superfund sites.
