Life changed dramatically a little more than a year ago for people in a small Arkansas town.
Thousands of gallons of heavy crude oil began spilling from a pipeline many residents didn't even realize ran under Mayflower (population 2,234), a quiet place blessed by its proximity to Lake Conway.
Exxon Mobil Corp.'s Pegasus pipeline, which carried crude from Canada, ruptured on March 29, 2013. The resulting oil spill soaked a Mayflower neighborhood and threatened the lake, which has long been an enticing fishing spot for locals and for visitors.
Although a lot of work has been done to clear the crude away from the Faulkner County town, cleanup continues near the lake. So do lawsuits filed against the oil company by the state of Arkansas and by citizens.
Families have had to relocate from homes most affected by the oil spill. Many in the town suffer health issues they say developed since the spill.
The stench of the oil certainly lingers there as has the spill's impact. Mayflower is a different place, some contend, with long-term damage evidenced by lowered property values.
All of those issues are part of the ongoing litigation.
Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, who filed a joint lawsuit with the U.S. Attorney's office against Exxon Mobil Corp., recently made a frightening point.
The spill, thought to have dumped 200,000 gallons of this heavy Canadian crude, could have been much worse.
"It could have been beneath the Arkansas River," McDaniel said. Or it could have been in a less-accessible place in the forest floor, hampering the response.
McDaniel was participating in a recent forum about the spill at the Clinton School of Public Service in Little Rock.
"We were lucky. Were you lucky if you lived in that neighborhood? No, of course not. But from an ecological standpoint, it could have been much more disastrous in different areas."
The 65-year-old pipeline snakes through Arkansas from Illinois en route to Texas, where a section of it may be reopened.
Theoretically, the pipe could have ruptured anywhere along the line, which has been in place so long that a couple of generations of Arkansans likely had no real clue of where it was, just like those Mayflower folks who were surprised last year.
Incidentally, they may appreciate the thought that a couple of hundred thousand gallons of crude oil in the Arkansas River would be a huge disaster, affecting many more people and properties. But that thought doesn't displace the concerns they have for their own community and the lasting impact of the spill that did occur.
Images from the yearlong saga define what had been a quiet town settled in between Conway and Little Rock on a stretch of Interstate 40, which carries many Mayflower citizens to jobs in the nearby towns.
The lasting images are of the thick, black liquid running down streets and between homes in the Northwoods subdivision, coating lawns and woods and even wildlife.
There are images of environmental workers clad in protective clothing wading the oil-covered water on the edges of Lake Conway. And images of people packed into meeting rooms, trying to get answers about what had happened and what anyone was going to do about it.
Even on Mayflower's standing website, Mayor Randy Holland acknowledges the detrimental effect of the oil spill.
"Certainly, 2013 was not the greatest year," he reported. But he praised first responders for their efforts to control the damage and protect the citizenry. He even said Exxon Mobil Corp. had done a good job of cleaning things up.
Mostly, the message focuses on the community's future. Mayflower must "move forward," he said, despite experiencing recession, flooding and this oil spill.
It is not an easy turn and the spill won't be out of people's minds any time soon.
Commentary on 04/09/2014