Bob Puchniak rejects suggestions that his company is responsible for toxic gases assailing a farm family in southwestern Manitoba.
A teenage boy collapsed at the Bill Campbell farm near Tilston, Man., Aug. 26 shortly after a hand-held monitor he was carrying detected high levels of toxic gas.
Tundra Oil and Gas burns off hydrogen sulfide at a production facility west of the farm. Hydrogen sulfide yields sulfur dioxide, a less poisonous gas, when burned.
Puchniak, president of Tundra Oil and Gas, said the company monitors its facility to ensure it poses no health hazards. Staff checked the facility after learning the boy had collapsed but could find no problem.
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“If there are gases there, they sure as hell aren’t coming from our facility a mile away,” said Puchniak. “We think we’re good citizens, we’re concerned about our neighbors and we want to get along well with them.”
Allan Campbell, 17, collapsed the night of Aug. 26. He passed out just as a hand-held monitor that detects sulfur dioxide started to ring, signaling dangerous levels of the gas.
“I remember falling to my knees and hearing a ringing,” the teen said last week. “The next thing I remember is Grandpa calling me.”
“I had the worst headache I’ve ever had in my life. It just felt like my head was going to explode.”
He had a stiff neck for a few days following the incident, but has since recovered.
It’s not the first time toxic gases have caused concern at the Campbell farm. Allan’s grandfather, Bill Campbell, fears his health is being ruined by gases.
The senior Campbell now sleeps in a camper trailer at Tilston, about eight kilometres from the family farm. He worries sulfur dioxide will accumulate in his farm house when there’s a breeze from the west.
“I don’t dare sleep in the house,” he said in a telephone interview from his farm home. “I’m scared to sleep here.”
Campbell first began to worry about the effects of sulfur dioxide three years ago. He went to a doctor with swollen and blistered eyelids, a condition he now associates with the gas.
Since then, he has been afflicted with other health problems, which he also attributes to the Tundra facility. Those problems have included chest pains, headaches, muscle cramps, memory loss and lapses in his sense of hearing and smell.
“I’ve had several exposures,” Campbell said. “Every time I get an exposure, bang, I go outside and I can’t walk 30 feet.”
Earlier this summer, Manitoba Environment installed a sulfur dioxide monitor at the Campbell farm. The monitor, which is checked about once a week, collects data 24 hours a day.
Campbell said the government monitor hit the top of its scale the day his grandson collapsed. The monitor has hit its maximum of five parts per million on at least five occasions, he said.
Bernie Chrisp, Manitoba Environment director for the Park-West region, traveled to Tilston Aug. 28 to check the government equipment.
“We found there was some sulfur dioxide found on the monitor,” Chrisp said. The monitor had hit the top of its scale around the time Allan Campbell collapsed Aug. 26.
Manitoba Environment was unable to pinpoint the source of sulfur dioxide last week. The department plans to continue monitoring the air at the Campbell farm.
“In this particular area, the oil wells probably are the main source of hydrogen sulfide,” Chrisp said.
Oil wells in the Tilston area have the highest concentration of hydrogen sulfide in Manitoba. Manure can also give off the gases, but in smaller quantities.
Tundra Oil and Gas has previously tested to ensure its production facility is safe. Several government departments have also visited the site, said Puchniak, and found that it met emission standards.
“I wish we could pinpoint the problem,” Puchniak said. “If there was a problem at our facility, I can assure you we’d fix it.”
