Utility Surprised by Threat of Legal Action Over Taum Sauk Collapse

Governor Matt Blunt is calling for criminal or civil charges to be filed against AmerenUE in the wake of the Taum Sauk Reservoir collapse a story that ran in a prominent St. Louis newspaper. A story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says the supervisor of Ameren’s Taum Sauk Reservoir tried to warn his higher-ups that a September overtopping of the reservoir’s walls had damaged it and could lead to bigger problems. Less than three months later, another overtopping caused the reservoir to fail, sending a billion-gallon wall of water through Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park, wiping out the park ranger’s family home and injuring his three children. Ameren’s Susan Gallagher won’t directly confirm whether the e-mail warning existed. When pressed on the subject, Gallagher abruptly ended the interview. Before hanging up, Gallagher had also questioned why the Governor was asking for charges, since the federal government has the oversight and is doing the investigation on the actual reservoir collapse.