At 1.00 PM, local time, on January 25 this year, the deactivated Tailings Dam 1 of the Córrego do Feijão (“Bean Stream”) iron ore mine, owned by Brazil’s world-renowned mining group Vale and located near the small town of Brumadinho in the Brazilian State of Minas Gerais, suddenly collapsed. The alarm siren did not sound. Hundreds were engulfed in the ensuing deluge. The rush of sludge – it could have travelled as fast as 120 km/h – also engulfed an unknown number of animals (farm, domestic and wild). The flood ended up covering, and destroying the vegetation in, an area of at least 269.84 ha, and also contaminated the Paraopeba River, the source of 43% of the area’s water supply.
