Since the dam collapsed, Geraldo Gonçalves de Oliveira, farmer from the city of Mário Campos, collects water samples from the river, hoping to see it clean again.
Farmers near Brumadinho, in the city of Mário Campos, who relied on the Paraopeba River to water their crops, are left with no options since January 25th, when a tailing dam from an iron ore mine from Vale, a Brazilian mining company, collapsed, flooding with almost 13 million m³ of toxic mud the district of Córrego do Feijão, in the city of Brumadinho, in Minas Gerais state.
Hundreds of people are dead or missing. The Paraopeba River was contaminated for kilometers, and thousands of people had their life impacted.
This environmental crime takes place a little over three years after the dam collapse in the city of Mariana, also in Minas Gerais state, controlled by Vale and British-Australian BHP.