In recent days, there have been many dreamlike scenes on the streets of the Colombian city of Mosquera.
White clouds fell on the street, and a young girl ran excitedly to see a cloud fly softly.
Among the white clouds, a small dog passed calmly, and the surrounding clouds rose and fell.
A young mother holds her child through thick white, glowing clouds that look like they could be seen through an airplane window.
This is...... Have a crew making fantasy movies here?
Or is heaven chosen to descend on Colombia?
The truth is not so dreamy:
These "clouds" are bubbles wafting from polluted rivers.
They just look good, but they are actually pungent and toxic.
The city of Mosquera is only 2 km from Bogotá, Colombia, and over the past few years industrial wastewater, chemicals and household detergents from the capital's industrial district have been discharged into the Barcilla River in the city of Moscala.
Contaminants accumulate, and the surface activators and phosphates inside are mixed with the water, creating a toxic white foam.
These foam molecules repel water at one end and attract water at the other, and most of the time they congregate on the surface of rivers.
But during the rainy season, the rain will make the number of bubbles soar, and with a little strong wind, the bubbles can easily drift into the residential areas of The City of Moskra, forming a spectacle of "people in the clouds".
From the photos, the bubble of the Barcilla River can grow larger than any residential building, and after a rainstorm, the foam rises like a giant bun.
At first, people still thought it was new and funny, but soon the citizens found that something was wrong.
Every time the bubbles come over, the number of people in the city with colds, respiratory problems, and skin allergies surges.
These bubbles have a sour smell that people's noses, and if a child touches it, they will soon get sick.
Claudia Garzon, a local resident, told the media that her lungs were so uncomfortable because there were bubbles everywhere that she had to use an inhaler during the annual rainy season.
Gonzalo Roa, the old man, said: "Now that I think about it, everything is clear. It's the bubbles that cause colds, illnesses, and make it hard for kids to breathe... And the houses. All the doors and windows were destroyed, and this has been going on for years. ”
Foam that looks mild and soft can actually corrode objects.
Owner Luis Romero complains that the foam not only smokes the guests away, "but they damage everything, and if the foam falls on the door, the door rots." ”
Citizens face the white foam as if they were seeing terrible sewage spreading continuously. Essentially, it is also indeed sewage.
It can invade people's backyards...
Blocking the view from the street...
Forcing children to go to school and take a long detour...
In everyday life in the city of Moskra, it is pervasive.
The neighborhood committee told the city government many times to let them deal with it. Two years ago, the municipal government built a sewage treatment plant to purify the Balcila River, but to no avail.
There are too many pollutants floating from the capital Bogotá, and because of years of eutrophication, many plants grow in the river, making it easier for bubbles to accumulate.
The neighborhood committee wanted to clean up on its own, but it had no funds and no technology.
This light, fluffy thing is actually very difficult to clean up, luz Gomez, the chairman of the neighborhood committee, said: "It is stuck to the place where it arrives like grease, and it is difficult to clean up a little, and it can grow more." ”
In desperation, the whole city can only choose to lie flat and endure, And Gomez's biggest worry is that someone accidentally fell into a ditch full of foam, "God, then we can't find him!" ”
These days, because aquatic plants block the river, the city of Moskra has once again become an unpopular "paradise of clouds".
This small city was suddenly in the international news, and finally brought pressure to the local municipal government.
Mayor Gian Giarometta tweeted that they have joined forces with the Environmental Protection Agency, the Health Authority, the Risk Management Department, local companies and the Fire Department to manage the bubble-flooded area.
The task of cleaning up the foam is carried out by the fire department, and solving the source problem is thought of by the remaining departments. The Health Department has completed a primary health care assessment, and Mayor Gilmerta said they had found no damage to people's health from the bubble.
The mayor was very confident, saying in media interviews that "the bubble is expected to disappear in the next few days".
This time it is important, the bubble can be quickly cleaned up, and the next time the bubble appears again, what should the citizens do?
Well, isn't it hard to be on the last international news...?
The occurrence of a large number of bubbles in polluted rivers occurs from time to time around the world, most notably the Yamuna River in India.
The Yamuna River is a tributary of the Ganges and one of the most important rivers in northern India, with a water system accounting for 40.2% of the Ganges basin.
The river flows from glaciers in the Himalayas and the water upstream is good, but when it reaches Delhi, a 22-kilometre stretch of the river passes through 15 sewers, all of which drain into the Yamuna River.
Little of the sewage has been treated, and the Yamuna River is littered with pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, industrial wastewater and household sewage.
Although the section of the river accounts for only 2% of the total length of the Yamuna River, the amount of pollution reaches 80% of the total.
When there is little rainfall, because of the lack of enough water to dilute pollutants, the surface of the Yamuna River is floating with white foam, which at first glance looks like An Antarctic.
Some officials called the river "roughly equivalent to a sewer," and residents know it's dirty, but every year during the festival, they still bathe in the Yamuna River because it's holy in Hinduism.
Watching people beat gongs and drums in the foam, play with water and take a bath, it is really frightening,
After bathing, who knows what kind of disease will be?
The beautiful scenery of white clouds is actually the consequence of polluting water sources,
I hope that such a fantastic scene will be less in the future...