Faced with public outrage after its second mining dam collapse in four years killed at least 240 people in Brazil, Vale misrepresented what it had done to shut down its riskiest dams, a review of the company’s statements shows. Fabio Schvartsman, Vale’s then-chief executive, said at a nationally broadcast news conference days after the dam burst in late January that the company had already decommissioned nine "upstream dams" in the wake of a 2015 disaster involving the same type of structure, and planned to dismantle ten more over the next few years. The company repeated the claim in a statement on its website.
