Russian, Chinese experts begin Amur River monitoring.

10/8 Tass 62

KHABAROVSK, August 10 (Itar-Tass) - Russian and Chinese experts begin
the next stage of the environmental monitoring of the Amur River, the head
of the Far Eastern department on meteorology and environmental monitoring,
Alexander Gavrilov, told Itar-Tass on Tuesday.
On August 10-14, specialists will take samples to analyze water from
the Amur River downstream from the village of Nizhneleninsky in the Jewish
Autonomous Region to Khabarovsk.
The date of the monitoring was planned beforehand, but it turned out
that waters from the Sungari River, the largest of the tributaries of the
Amur River, where chemical barrels were swept after heavy floods, approach
the Russian-Chinese border.
Experts from the Far Eastern meteorology department and the
Emergencies Ministry took water samples downstream from Khabarovsk to
define the background level of the river.
"At present, water meets microbiological norms and basic physical and
chemical requirements," the Khabarovsk region emergencies department said.
The results of water samples in the village of Nizhneleninsky, where
the Sungari meets the Amur, will show whether the river waters were
polluted after floods swept 7,000 chemical barrels into the waterway from
warehouses of two chemical plants in Jilin city, Jilin Province, on July
28.
The Chinese side assured that all barrels were taken out from the
Sungari River and the river water was not contaminated.
Water from the Sungari River will reach Khabarovsk on August 14-15.
The city gets drinking water from the water intake structure in the Amur
River bed, therefore preventive measures were taken to ensure population's
security at any level of the river waters' contamination.
In case of emergency the population will get drinking water from the
reserve sources, but experts of the Russian consumer rights' watchdog and
the Far Eastern department on meteorology and environmental monitoring
expressed confidence that such situation is unlikely.

-0-isk/gor