From Michigan to the Nation – A Groundwater Emergency
Furious and fearful, residents are asking a simple but urgent question: what’s in my water?
But PFAS are the tip of the spear for threats to groundwater in Michigan and nationally. Nitrates, industrial chemicals, and pathogens have been swept underground for decades — aquifers used as garbage cans. What else is in the groundwater? And what are the risks?
A collaborative series produced by:
Michigan groundwater
PFAS and PFOS Across The Nation
Stacks of free bottled water sit at Parchment High School. Residents have been advised not to drink the tap water after tests showed it contained PFAS, a group of chemicals used in many products and as a flame retardant. Photo © Jim Malewitz/ Bridge
PFAS contamination leaves fruits and veggies to wither
Michigan’s PFAS contamination emergency
By Mary Ellen Geist, Bureau Chief, Detroit Public Television’s Great Lakes Bureau, greatlakesnow.org
Monitoring wells stand as silent sentinels on the grounds of a field used as a fire training site at Wurtsmith Air Force Base. Photo © Brett Walton / Circle of Blue
Fear and Fury in Michigan Town Where Air Force Contaminated Water
By Brett Walton, Circle of Blue
Sticky foam rings a public beach near on Van Etten Lake near the shuttered Wurtsmith Air Force base. State environmental officials said it resembled foam that has tested positive for high levels of toxic perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances. Photo © Jim Malewit/Bridge
Environmentalists outraged Michigan warning about PFAS went unheeded
Is PFAS from Michigan’s Huron River contaminating Lake Erie’s fish?
By Mary Ellen Geist, Bureau Chief, Detroit Public Television’s Great Lakes Bureau, greatlakesnow.org
A truck similar to this one will be used to suck up toxic PFAS foam around parts of Oscoda, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality said. (Photo courtesy of