Watch the Eatonville landfill clean up speed by

Nisqually State Park has beautiful views of Mount Rainier, thriving forest, and two rivers — and until last year, there was an old, open, leaking landfill in the middle. There was no cover on top, so wildlife could walk over or dig in old trash and debris. And unlike modern landfills, there was no liner at the bottom. Contamination could seep from the landfill into the surrounding soil, groundwater, and river — but not anymore! The Eatonville landfill cleanup is almost complete, and you can watch it speed by in this timelapse video.

The landfill site slopes steeply down to wetlands near the Mashel River. As they dug contaminated soil out, the cleanup crew had to keep clean soil from falling right back in. They worked their way down the hill in stages, first digging out a section of trash, then building a concrete retaining wall to hold back the clean earth so they could dig out the next part.

Tag, you’re it!

Workers used a 50-foot long-reach excavator to dig out the old trash because it could reach farther down the hill. The excavator kept a pair of dump trucks busy relaying trash and contaminated soil from the dig site to the top of the hill. From there, larger trucks picked it up and hauled it to a lined landfill in Puyallup. In the video you can watch the holding area fill up and empty over and over.

All cleaned up — almost

Excavation at the old landfill is done. To finish up, workers regraded the slope, planted baby trees, and seeded it with grass.

Workers also installed monitoring wells at the base of the hill near the wetland. Samples showed what could be petroleum contamination in the wetland area. Some natural compounds can look like petroleum in tests, so we’re doing more analysis to make sure. Petroleum contamination usually fades over time, and trying to remove soil there would destroy a lot of healthy habitat. We’ll keep checking to make sure any contamination is breaking down like we expect.

Paying for the cleanup

Weyerhaeuser owns the landfill property, which is surrounded by the state park. They leased it to the Town of Eatonville, who used it as a dump from about 1950 to 1980. Weyerhaeuser and the Town of Eatonville are responsible for the cleanup. Ecology awarded Eatonville $7.4 million in grant funding to cover the town’s half of the cleanup cost. That grant money comes mainly from the hazardous substance tax, a voter-initiated tax that is the largest source of funding for environmental cleanups in Washington.

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