![]() ![]() This was a history the elders suspected all along. The 1969 Water Pollution Survey of the Wabigoon River was written by the Ontario Water Resources Commission - now part of the province’s environment ministry. The Office of the Chief Coroner said without specific details that it could not look up how the deaths were classified.īased on a 1969 report, uncovered by our investigation, the province had concerns about “gross” pollution levels entering the English-Wabigoon river system caused by the Dryden mill, also noting the waste from the pulp and paper mill had been entering the river since it opened in 1913. We were told they did not have any information. The family's Sioux Lookout doctor blamed Donny’s death on an “incurable disease," said Riffel.īut to this day, Riffel believes it was the water from the Wabigoon River that poisoned her brother, and she has been trying to bring it to the attention of the Ontario government and media for years.Īs part of this investigation, we asked federal and provincial government departments, such as Indigenous Services Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Indigenous Affairs, about the premature deaths in Quibell. Until they suspected something was wrong with the water, it was a good place to live, Riffel said. The Petiquan family was living in Quibell, a small community that would draw water from the Wabigoon River. Riffel said her brother was just nine months old when he died in September 1948. Riffel, now 82, sat down with the team to share her story. The water system was rendered toxic by discharges from a pulp mill in Dryden, Ont. Her baby brother, Donny, was one of 10 children who died in the community during their first year of life.Īs part of this investigation, a small team of journalists and student journalists travelled to Quibell and Wabauskang, a community whose residents lived and worked along the English-Wabigoon river system. But the misery didn't end with the death of one sibling. ![]() He had a prolonged seizure and then just stopped moving, the Wabauskang First Nation elder said during a face-to-face interview, before the pandemic made travel to Ontario’s remote communities impossible. Though the death happened 70 years ago in the northern Ontario community of Quibell, the haunting memory is still fresh. Part 3 looks at the lingering effects of contaminated water in Asubpeeschoseewagong Netum-Anishinabek.īetty Riffel recalls the day she watched her baby brother die. Part 2 focuses on one of the communities still fighting for compensation. Gigoo-Aakoosi: Fish Is Sick Part 1 examined the history of the pollution that affected both communities. Before the pandemic struck, a team of journalists and journalism students travelled north to hear first-hand accounts of what it was like for Indigenous people to live with the aftermath of an environmental catastrophe and continued long-term drinking water advisories. Through a nationwide investigation called Clean Water, Broken Promises, led by the Institute for Investigative Journalism and in partnership with Humber College and Canada's National Observer, we examine how water issues impact Indigenous communities. Gigoo-Aakoosi: Fish Is Sick tells the story of the Asubpeeschoseewagong Netum Anishinabek, also known as Grassy Narrows First Nation, and Wabauskang First Nation and the historical and ongoing devastation endured by those living with water contamination. This is Part 2 of a three-part series called Gigoo-Aakoosi: Fish Is Sick.
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