In response to a complaint about a resident burying and burning trash on their property, the Person County Health Department began an investigation of groundwater in the area of Country Club Road. After finding the presence of tetrachloroethene (PCE) contaminated groundwater in one private well, the Person County Health Department sampled additional private wells in this area and discovered the presence of PCE contaminated groundwater in three wells at concentrations above the Maximum Contaminate Level (MCL) of 5 parts per billion (ppb).
Based on these finding the Person County Health Department mailed notification letters to residents with elevated levels of PCE and DCE in their wells. The notification letters included a health advisory against drinking water obtained from these wells.
On March 6, 2009, the North Carolina Department of Environmental and Natural Resources referred this site to EPA. Initial response actions taken by EPA consisted of providing drinking water to three of the residences identified to be at risk from exposure to contaminated groundwater. Additional response objectives identified by EPA included identifying any additional private wells which could be at risk, performing additional sampling of these private wells, and identifying and mitigating the source of groundwater contamination. On April 1, 2009, EPA’s Science and Ecological Support Division performed a sampling investigation on six private wells in this area. The sampling results from the April 1, 2009, sampling event indicated that levels of PCE had decreased in concentration relative to the concentrations from previous sampling event. Furthermore the results revealed that one of the private wells had PCE at a concentration above the corresponding MCL. The other five wells were either non-detect or had concentrations of PCE below the MCL.
EPA will perform an additional round of groundwater sampling for the same six residences sampled during the April 1, 2009, sampling event. The results of this next sampling event will be used to identify a response action for this site. Meanwhile EPA will continue to provide drinking water to three of the area residents.
Assess groundwater for a possible trend in concentration of groundwater contaminates, continue to provide drinking water as an interim response action, and identify a final response action for this site.
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