"A local official said proper authorities were notified, but state regulators said they weren’t made aware of the blaze until an inspection two weeks after the fire began."
"NEW MARKET, Ala. — Merri Gardunia thought her house might be on fire.
Gardunia, a special education teacher, was on her way home in August 2023 when she saw the smoke billowing above her road in New Market, Alabama, a small town just northeast of Huntsville.
As she got closer, she sighed in relief. It wasn’t her house. It was the landfill next door. She’d never seen smoke at the site before, but she didn’t think too much of it, she told Inside Climate News. That was before she began waking up with migraines. She’d had headaches before the fire, Gardunia said, but nothing like these.
Last week, the Alabama Department of Environmental Management announced it would fine Madison County $5,000 for an open burn the state regulator deemed as a “serious violation” of environmental regulations. The fire at the county-owned landfill, ignited by a spark from an on-site incinerator, according to landfill workers, smoldered for 50 days, into October, after local firefighters did what they could to put out the blaze.
Tom Brandon, the county commissioner who represents the district where the landfill fire burned, told Inside Climate News that the fire has been “made into a bigger deal than it was.”"
Lee Hedgepeth reports for Inside Climate News January 27, 2024.
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