Storage Tanks

Calling the water shortage in South Carroll "critical," the county commissioners enacted an immediate ban on outdoor water use yesterday for the Freedom District, the county's most populous region.The ban extends only to the 6,500 households that use the Freedom water system. The district, which encompasses Sykesville and unincorporated Eldersburg, is home to more than 28,000 people.Residents must discontinue "lawn watering, car washing and outside water usage until further notice," according to a news release issued late yesterday.

PANCEVO, Yugoslavia -- Dragomir Djuric says he has been fishing the Tamis river for 48 years, pulling fat catfish out of its depths using live black leeches as bait.Unless they are eaten, he says, the leeches usually stay on the hook for five days.In recent weeks, he says, something in the water has changed. The leeches die in a day, and are white when pulled out, looking as if they had been "boiled."The fish, he says, are different, too -- sluggish and sickly, with protruding bones and bulging eyes.

Carroll County engineers will review bids from four contractors before recommending which one should build a 115-foot-high water tower in Eldersburg.Bids, opened yesterday, ranged from $810,000 to nearly $1.2 million, according to county officials."

The County Commissioners yesterday approved a request from Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. to build two hot dog-shaped natural gas storage tanks at the Northern Landfill.BGE must also receive approval from the county Board of Zoning Appeals and the state Department of Transportation, which regulates natural gas facilities.The utility wants to build two 35,000-gallon tanks at the landfill in Reese by December 1999. The tanks will hold natural gas chilled to a liquid state at 260 degrees below zero.

Southern States Cooperative Inc. is studying its options after Mount Airy's zoning appeals board turned down its plan to build bulk petroleum storage tanks in an undeveloped industrial park.The board's decision was greeted with applause by about 20 Twin Arch Road and Conestoga Heights subdivision residents who attended a hearing Tuesday night to oppose the proposal.Attorney David A. Severn, who represented Southern States, said the Virginia-based cooperative has not decided whether to appeal the decision in court.

In a saga with all the trappings of a country and western song, an Edgewood defense contractor is to be arraigned in federal court in Baltimore today on charges of defrauding the government and funneling more than $90,000 of the money into his wife's fledgling Nashville career.In all, prosecutors say, Robert David Leas, 48, stole nearly $500,000, using some of the proceeds to help Alicia Faye Major, 30.That money, the prosecutors say, paid for Major's two-bedroom Nashville townhouse, care for her young son, a $4,000-a-month manager and studio production help from a former drummer for country star Waylon Jennings.

A proposal for four 30,000-gallon and three 15,000-gallon petroleum storage tanks will go to the Mount Airy zoning appeals board with a favorable recommendation from the town planning commission.Southern States Cooperative Inc. plans to put the tanks on a 6.2-acre industrial site in the Pleasants property on East Ridge- ville Boulevard near Century Drive."We're interested in a terminal facility at Mount Airy," said Jerry Gass, Southern States director of communications.But plans are preliminary, and the corporation has not bought the proposed site from owners William Pleasants Sr. and Jr., he said.

Thermo Remediation Inc., a Florida company specializing in removing contaminants from soil, announced yesterday it has acquired a Baltimore firm to establish a presence in the Mid-Atlantic region.Included in the purchase of Environmental Recycling Associates (ERA) is a 62-acre soil facility in the Rosedale section of Baltimore County, which contains a 30,000-square-foot recycling center and related laboratory and office space.A Thermo Remediation official said ERA cost between $5 million and $10 million.

I was searching for the perfect winter vacation -- one that would offer natural beauty as well as a bustling city center. And I found it, surprisingly, in Iceland.Certainly, planning a winter trip to Iceland was a concern. But it's a popular myth that Iceland, the second largest island in Europe, is a frozen country. Despite its northerly location, the Gulf Stream actually keeps temperatures quite moderate.Iceland, which lies close to the Arctic Circle, is situated approximately halfway between Moscow and New York in the Atlantic Ocean and is only a two-hour flight from the United Kingdom.

A 16-inch water main burst inside a pumping station near Reisterstown Road and the Baltimore Beltway about 1 p.m. yesterday, disrupting service in a wide area of northwestern Baltimore County, from Pikesville and Randallstown as far west as Reisterstown, public works officials said.Streets around the pumping station were flooded as an estimated 1.5 million gallons from four elevated storage tanks in the area drained back through the system and out of the pumping station.Police closed Reisterstown Road to traffic between the Beltway and Old Court Road for several hours, creating a huge backup that spread onto the Beltway as drivers waited for the Reisterstown Road exit ramps to clear.

Charles T. Erdman Jr., a retired Bethlehem Steel Corp. manager and Navy veteran, died Nov. 17 of heart failure at his Arnold home. He was 80. Mr. Erdman, who was born and raised in East Baltimore, was a graduate of Patterson High School. He served in the Navy as a radio operator aboard the USS Caloosahatchee, a fleet oiler, from 1945 until 1948. In 1948, Mr. Erdman went to work for Bethlehem Steel's Buffalo Tank Division. During his 40-year career he held management positions at the company's plants at Sparrows Point, Buffalo, N.Y., Hallandale, Fla., and Dunellen, N.J. He was working in Baltimore when he retired in 1988.

Baltimore County has agreed to pay a fine to settle allegations that officials didn't report a potential leak from an underground diesel fuel tank and didn't properly check and upgrade underground fuel storage tanks at 13 county facilities, authorities said yesterday. The settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires the county to pay a $28,968 penalty and install a $90,000 computerized system to monitor the fuel tanks, according to the federal agency. The most serious violation was the failure to report a discrepancy in inventory records for an underground diesel fuel tank at a maintenance shop in Woodlawn in late 2006 and early 2007, according to the EPA. A discrepancy in inventory records can indicate leaks, said Donna Heron, an EPA spokeswoman.

State transportation officials said yesterday they expect to spend $24 million over the next five years to replace underground fuel storage tanks that fail to meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards. The tanks are at a dozen Maryland Transit Administration facilities and store the diesel fuel and gasoline used by buses, MARC trains and other state vehicles, officials said. James F. Ports Jr., deputy secretary of the Department of Transportation, told the Board of Public Works yesterday that the tank replacements are part of a negotiated settlement with EPA that also requires the state to pay a penalty of $172,207.

Baltimore County fire officials announced yesterday that an organization that measures risk for insurance companies has determined the rural areas of the county are better protected from fire than before. Insurance Services Office has changed the county's fire protection rating in the rural area not served by fire hydrants from nine to six under a scale of one to 10, with one being the safest, fire officials said. Areas of the county served by public water continue to receieve a three in the most recent ratings, which were issued to the fire department in June, officials said.

An official with a fuel company named in a $200 million class action suit filed by northern Baltimore County residents said yesterday that underground storage tanks at a Parkton gas station were properly monitored, under the supervision of state environmental officials. John Phelps, executive vice president of Carroll Independent Fuel, said company and Maryland Department of the Environment records show that gasoline has not leaked from storage tanks at a Citgo station at Wally's Country Store.

A year ago, Alan and Caroline Millet filled the tank in the crawl-space below their living room floor with 250 gallons of heating oil to keep their Edgewater home warm during the winter months. Soon the smell of oil began to permeate all the rooms in their house, and they worried that the noxious liquid might have seeped into their water supply. An inspection showed the rusty edge of the steel tank, which was almost four decades old, had ruptured and leaked all of the oil into the ground.

Seeking to quell public anger over the state's handling of residential well contamination in the Fallston area of Harford County, Maryland's top environmental official assured residents there yesterday that his agency is moving to stop future leaks of the gasoline additive now found to be tainting about 250 wells in the area. "I'm as frustrated as you are with the problem," said state Environment Secretary Kendl P. Philbrick, whose home is within a half-mile of the Exxon service station suspected of being a major source of the contamination.

Seeking to quell public anger over the state's handling of residential well contamination in the Fallston area of Harford County, Maryland's top environmental official assured residents yesterday that his agency is moving to stop future leaks of the gasoline additive now found to be tainting about 250 wells in the area. "I'm as frustrated as you are with the problem," said state Environment Secretary Kendl P. Philbrick, whose home is within a half-mile of the Exxon service station suspected of being a major source of the contamination.

State officials announced yesterday a sharp reduction in the level of contamination of a gasoline additive at the underground storage tanks of an Exxon station in the Upper Crossroads section of Harford County, but said that does not solve the problem of the apparent leak. "This is good news, but it does not mean the problem has been solved or that the department's scrutiny of the situation will decrease," said Kendl P. Philbrick, secretary of the Maryland Department of the Environment.

NATIONAL Kerry swift boat debate The controversy over Sen. John Kerry's Vietnam record continued to dominate the presidential campaign over the weekend. Kerry intensified efforts to tie President Bush to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that says the Democrat lied about his service. Also, a member of the group resigned as a Bush campaign adviser on veterans after it was discovered that he is featured in the group's new ad. [Page 6a] WORLD Najaf battle, mosque talksExplosions and gunfire shook Najaf's Old City yesterday in a fierce battle between U.S. forces and Iraqi Shiite militants, as talks dragged on for the handover of the shrine that the fighters have used as a stronghold.