Honourable George Heyman, 

I have been researching about the Mount Polley mine disaster and more in depth about what happened, including the cause of the occurrence and the long-lasting effects. I have learnt about how the disaster occurred and how the engineers played a part behind it in not using glacier slit underneath the tailing’s containment pod. This led to structural insufficiencies which was the main cause of the dam’s massive collapse, spilling around 25 billion litres of contaminated materials into Polley Lake, Hazeltine Creek and Quesnel Lake. Although it has been years since this disaster, the waters are still contaminated and Mount Polley is continuing to deposit remaining waste from the mine into the Quesnel Lake from a 10-kilometer pipeline. With all this spillage, it has a long-lasting effect on the salmon and their habitats since these areas were major spawning grounds. On top of this, although the mine only spilled into certain areas, the water continues to flow everywhere else, specifically the Quesnel Lake which connects to the Fraser River which ultimately leads to the Pacific Ocean. Now with the waste infecting these areas as well, it is having an impact on the trout fisheries and Fraser River salmon stocks, not to mention the Pacific Ocean is already the most polluted ocean. With all this damage and Mount Polley violating 15 rules under the B.C.’s environmental and mining laws, the engineers and anyone apart of this were not fined, leaving residents unhappy and in shock. I believe that there should have been a fine, but it is too late to do anything about it now, but I hope that we can prevent this from happening again by learning from past building mistakes and remembering all the risks of the lasting problems that still affect us to this day. 

1. ASK

• What would happen if they remade the Mount Polley mine? 
• Are there any future problems for the surrounding areas like lakes, rivers, and oceans? 
• What led up to the Mount Polley disaster (how did it occur)? 
• What were the people and resident’s reactions after no chargers were pressed? 
• What does the future look like for the environment and others affected? 

       2. ACQUIRE

The only familiar digital tool I used to complete part of my research was google and YouTube, but for the other half, I tried out new websites such as Gale Engage and Pexels. I found that Gale Engage had very useful information for my topic so I will be using that one for future research projects.  

3. ANALYZE

To verify and investigate the websites that I used, I checked for the publish dates and when it has recently been edited, this gives a good indication to whether to information is still relevant and correct to this day. To cite the information I found, I either pressed one of the options that allows you to cite it, or I copied the link.  

4. ASSESS

I found parts of completing this challenge very smooth and easy, but others were a bit harder to overcome. I found it hard to use some of the new websites for researching my topic because I wasn’t completely used to it, and it was hard to find the right information. However, once I was able to get going and have all the information I needed, it was easy to format and put it into sway. One thing that I could have done better was coming up with more unique and successful guide questions because it would make the sway more interesting and educational.