Fifteen people explored the Duwamish River Superfund Site with UW SRP Community Engagement Manager BJ Cummings on Saturday, Sept. 7.
On Saturday, September 7th, 15 kayakers joined UW SRP Community Engagement Manager, BJ Cummings, to paddle the waters of the Duwamish River, learning about its history and status as a Superfund Site. Before launch, participants learned about the river clean up from Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition's Superfund Manager, James Rasmussen. Then they headed into the river where BJ led them on a tour that highlighted views of the daylighted Hamm Creek, a zero-discharge shipyard known as Delta Marine, and Boeing's Plant 2.
Along the way, Cummings discussed key findings from UW SRP Projects 1 & 2, describing how Evan Gallagher's lab has shown that cadmium, one of the contaminants in the Duwamish River, is known to impair salmon's sense of smell. Without being able to smell, salmon cannot successfully avoid predators, find food, or navigate back to their native breeding grounds. Cummings also described how the lab of Zhengui Xia has shown that cadmium is associated with neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.
