Revelations 8 Verses 10 and 11 (KJV)

10 And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters;

11 And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter.

Hungary sludge nears Danube River

The toxic sludge that poured through several communities in Hungary has reached a branch of the Danube River, an environmental official says.

The caustic red slurry was released Monday after a reservoir burst at an alumina refining plant in Ajka, about 160 kilometres southwest of Budapest.

Rescue crews rushed to the scene to try to help flood victims and contain the slurry before it reached the Danube, a major European waterway.

But emergency services officials said Thursday that the alkalinity was elevated in the Raba River, which flows into the Danube, and that some pollution had been detected in the Mosoni branch.

Emergency spokesman Tibor Dobson said crews are trying to reduce the alkaline content of the slurry that left more than 100 people with chemical burns.

“The alkaline content of the river is much lower than it was originally,” Budapest-based freelance journalist Henk Hirs told CBC News on Thursday.

“By the time the pollution will have reached the proper river Danube, likely in a few days time, it will have been diluted even more,” he said.

Hirs said that environmental officials believe that the lower concentration of sludge should limit the environmental damage to communities downriver.

Community destroyed

Meanwhile, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban said he sees “no point” in rebuilding some of the houses in the same location made uninhabitable by the flood.

The prime minister visited the hard-hit town of Kolontar on Thursday.

“It’s a serious ecological catastrophe, but we don’t know the size of it,” Orban told reporters.

Local officials said 34 houses in the village of about 800 were so badly damaged by the caustic slurry that they cannot be refurbished.

Police in Hungary have opened a criminal inquiry into the flood that left four people dead and more than 100 injured.

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/10/07/hungary-sludge-danube.html#ixzz11g7BQNoQ