Plaquemines Parish is home to a large fish processing facility that regularly spews a foul-smelling, dark, and smelly slurry of pulverized fishguts and feces into nearby rivers and canals. An insider of the company was later charged in a lawsuit.
Both government officials and environmental groups raised concerns about Daybrook FisheriesEmpire plant for decades, but its former safety and environment manager now says that theplant has willfully polluted waterways. He also failed to take basic precautions to prevent leaks and spillages.
Karen Davis’ lawsuit claims that she was fired in aprilie after she repeatedly reported environmental hazards to company managers and executives between 2019-2021. Davis, who had been with the company for six year, filed her suit under the state environmental whistleblower statute. This statute protects employees from retaliation if they report environmental violations.
According to the lawsuit filed last week in U.S. District Court New Orleans, groundwater and adjacent waterways were at risk due to the company’s mishandling large volumes of liquid fish-waste and other pollutants.
Daybrook did no respond to requests for comment.
Daybrook Fisheries, Empire, seen from the distance in 2008
Wilma Suebra, an environmental scientist and member of the Environmental Science Committee, was not surprised by the allegations. Louisiana Environmental Action NetworkDaybrook was sued by a group of advocates in 2004 for water quality violations.
Subra stated that this facility has been poorly managed for years. They have such a large trash stream. It can get into rivers or canals and start to ferment, causing huge pollution problems.
Large quantities of fish waste can cause explosions of bacteria and algae that contain toxic substances that are dangerous to humans and marine life. Algae can quickly die and decomposing algae encourages the growth bacteria. This bacteria consumes both algae and a lot of the dissolved organic in the water.
According to Daybrook Fisheries’ ex-environmental manager, this photo shows Daybrook Fisheries pipes and a pump leaking an oily substance onto Empire’s Mississippi River batture in November 2020.
Dead zones, which are water depleted of oxygen, turn fish and shrimp off the coast and kill any that can escape, including oysters, crabs, and crabs. These zones have plagued the Gulf of Mexico for years. The largest, which covers over 6,300 square miles, is along the Louisiana coast.
Daybrook processes menhaden. A small fish that plays a large role in the Gulfs’ fishing industry, it is processed by Daybrook. The menhaden fishery in Louisiana is the largest by volume and the second in the U.S., often boasting annual harvests exceeding 550,000 tons. This fishery far exceeds the Gulf’s famous commercial catches of shrimp and crab.
Menhaden, also known by the pogie name, don’t end up in restaurants and grocery stores. Instead, the oil-rich fish is ground up at Daybrooks to be used in health supplements, pet food, fertilizers, and industrial lubricants.
Menhaden resembling a haring are used in fish meal, industrial greases, poultry and pig feed.
Daybrook was established by South African fishermen in 1955. Oceana Group2015. Daybrooks corporate office can be found in New Orleans. However, almost all of its 300 employees are based at the Empire plant. This plant processes approximately 40% of the Gulfs menhaden catch, according to the company. The plant produces around 90,000 tons of oil and fish meal each year.
Facility is ‘Aging, dilapidated, and problem-prone’
Daybrooks WebsiteThe plant is state of art and the company adheres to sustainable business principles that protect the Gulf menhaden fishing industry, its coastal waters, and its ecosystems.
Davis said that the reverse is true.
It runs an old, dilapidated, and problem-prone fish processing plant that regularly unloads an noxious mix fish scales, fins, and excrement. Her lawsuit stated that.
The plant can process large amounts of wastewater that has been pumped from large fishing vessels. Davis says that the plant mixes saltwater, fish parts, and feces with chemicals and other pollutants during processing.
She documented at most five instances where managers ignored her warnings regarding wastewater leaks, overflows, spillages, and faulty or insufficient equipment over the past three-years.
According to Karen Davis, Daybrook’s former environmental director, this photo shows a fish-oil tank overflowing at Daybrook Fisheries’ Empire menhaden processing plant in July 2020.
- Davis alerted managers in July 2020 to an overflowing of machine grease and fish oil into a pit that pumps into river. The company, despite being illegal, pumped the wastewater into a river regardless, according to Davis’ lawsuit. Other overflows saw wastewater and other contaminants being diverted into public ditches, or allowed to leach onto the batture.
- During a Zoom meeting with plant managers, Davis expressed concern about a leaking injection hole that could contaminate the groundwater. The vice president informed Davis that plugging the hole would be costly and he created a committee to look for a cheaper solution. Davis was not included in the committee.
- Davis stated that plant managers devised a way to manipulate wastewater samples. These samples are sent to an independent laboratory for testing to ensure compliance with environmental permit requirements. Davis claims that managers intended to dilute wastewater samples to make them appear cleaner than they actually were. Davis made the report to a company executive. Her lawsuit doesn’t state whether any action was taken against Davis.
On Nov. 3, 2003, commercial fishermen worked in the Gulf of Mexico to harvest menhaden. They were located just off the coast of southeast Louisiana. Crews in smaller boats take purse seines out and drag them to the mothership for unloading.
She and her lawyer couldn’t be reached for comment.
Daybrook often ignored Davis’ concerns when she raised them internally. However, when Davis mentioned some of them to an inspector she was fired by the company, she stated. Davis, a vice-president, and plant managers visited the plant last March with an outside auditor. Davis, who told the group that the plant’s new storage tanks weren’t adequate and that a chemical storage space posed environmental hazards, was given the order to leave. According to the lawsuit, the vice president angrily told Davis that she should have kept her mouth shut.
Davis also requested medical leave due to mounting anxiety that day. The leave was denied. Two weeks later she was fired.
A history of complaints
Davis wasn’t the only one to notice Daybrooks pollution problems.
The U.S. Coast Guard reported a 2012 spillage of approximately 50,000 menhaden, which covered two miles of Breton Sound. Coast Guard records show that a Daybrook fishing boat spilled the fish on its way to the plant. In 2018, the Coast Guard was alerted again when a Daybrook wastewater pipe burst and spread a silvery sheen along a section of Mississippi.
The shadow of a helicopter passes over a mass in dead menhaden from a Daybrook Fisheries vessel. Around 50,000 dead fish were spread over 2 miles of Breton Sound, near Plaquemines Parish.
Three complaints were filed by the Plaquemines Parish Health Department about Daybrook in 2019. According to state health officials, fishy, pungent, and sometimes frothy wastewater streams regularly flowed into public canals and ditches. Department of Environmental Quality. A DEQ inspector visited the site after the third complaint and found dark, smelly water coming from an unauthorized drain and outfall. The inspector was informed by the plant managers that they didn’t know of the existence this outfall existed.
Daybrook can discharge certain amounts of wastewater into Mississippi under the DEQ. However, the company has often exceeded these limits according to federal and state regulators.
LEAN sued Daybrook, a Subras group, in 2004 over 21 instances when the plant exceeded discharge limits. This was between 1997 and 2002. After Daybrook’s attorneys cited improvements in wastewater treatment within months of the lawsuit, a federal judge dismissed the suit.
Davis’s lawsuit seeks to have the court grant her lost wages, benefits, and anticipated earnings for a period of three year.
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