Background

The Córrego do Feijão dam was built in 1976 through the Ferteco Mineração as a tailings dam designed to store byproducts of mining operations preventing harmful products from entering the environment. In 2001 the dam was purchased by a multinational mining corporation Vale S.A. who operated the dam until 2014 when no more tailings were added to the dam. Vale S.A. did however continue to monitor the structure to insure its safety on a bi-weekly basis through field inspections and through the use of sensors that monitored the dam’s structural integrity, this would play a major role in the eventual disaster as there were known issues with the sensors. In December 2018 Vale S.A. received a licence permission to reuse the waste located within the Córrego do Feijão dam, approximately 11.7 million m² of waste, before decommissioning the site and closing it down. The Córrego do Feijão dam was classified as a small structure that posed a low risk of producing high potential damage, however, this would not be the case in Brumadinho. Lidar scans of the site had observed that there had been some vertical subsidence in the dam following the removal of some material was noted a few months before the fateful events in January 2019.

Impacts

Social

As a result of the mudslide 259 people were confirmed as dead as well as 11 who were missing at the time and now presumed dead, with the majority of the victims of the Brumadinho disaster being employees of Vale SA. Four of these deaths occurred at a nearby railway where three locomotives and 132 wagons were buried along with the 4 railwaymen that were missing and later presumed to have died.

Economic

As a result of the dam collapse and the ensuing mudslide many of the agricultural regions around Brumadinho were either impaired or completely destroyed with the loss of livestock during the event. There was also major damage to the local CBD meaning stores, businesses and local markets were closed for a few days while cleaning efforts began. As for Vale S.A. three days after the dam disaster the stock prices fell by 24%, equivalent to a loss of R$71.3 billion real (£9.9 Billion), which is the largest single day loss in the history of the Brazilian stock market.

Environmental

The Brumadinho dam disaster led to the worst environmental disaster in the history of Brazil with the collapse releasing 12 million m² of tailings, the contamination associated with these tailings has led to major negative impacts on the environmental health of the region. These tailings were not only deposited across the land surrounding the mine but also entered the nearby fluvial system where the metals were incorporated into the fluvial sediments. Within the tailings there were extremely high concentrations of metals such as Iron, Aluminium, Manganese, Copper, Lead and Cadmium as well as other toxic metals that are known to bioaccumulate within organic tissue. As a result of the collapse the concentrations of these metals within the wider environment greatly exceeded the levels outlined in Brazilian environmental legislation as well as established sediment quality regulations. This has greatly impacted the environmental health with damage seen to the flora and fauna in the impacted region with the presence of bioaccumulated metals within the tissue of organisms ranging from algae to larger fish species in the affected stretch of the river and further downstream. The mortality rates of species in the affected area was also greatly increased with the loss of species seen throughout the area.