Fish Kill Near San Estevan Renews Fears Over New River’s Health

A spike in dead fish near San Estevan is once again raising concerns about the health of the New River. The Department of the Environment confirms it responded to a fish kill in the Orange Walk District, an incident they say happens almost every year. Early monitoring points to a familiar culprit: low oxygen levels caused by recurring algal blooms, fueled by high nutrient runoff from activities all along the river. It’s a reminder of 2019, when the New River slipped into full eutrophication and turned foul. And while scientists say they now have a clearer understanding of the watershed and a plan for reducing pollution, one major fix remains out of reach: rerouting Orange Walk’s municipal drain so wastewater flows toward the savanna, not the river. Here’s more from Chief Environmental Officer Anthony Mai.

 

Anthony Mai, Chief Environmental Officer

“The Department of the Environment received reports of a fishkill near San Estevan Village in the Orange Walk District. We responded to the fishkill, as we normally do, and we conducted water monitoring of the area where the fishkill was observed and we have some data that highlights what we believe is the cause of the fishkill. But just to say that, again, this is an occurrence that happens almost every year or every two years. In fact, 2019, as you all may know, would have been the year when the New River really degraded to a bad state such that it suffered from eutrophication. Eutrophication means that there was an algal bloom, and normally algal blooms are caused by high nutrients within a water body and because the algae grow, proliferate, and bloom, they really draw down on the oxygen level within the water and that takes it into an anoxic state and then you have fishkill, etc. Everyone who operates along the river is contributing to towards this situation.”

 

Zenida Lanza

“So what does the future look like for the river?”

 

Anthony Mai

“From a pollution standpoint, it looks good because, like I said, we have studied the entire watershed for so long that we know we have a lot of good data on it and we know what our next steps are. What we don’t have is… the thing, for example, that we would want to do is, we would want the government to redesign the municipal drain from Orange Walk, so that the water from the drain runs towards the savanna.

 

DOE says real progress now hinges on long‑overdue infrastructure fixes to ease the strain on the New River.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

Watch the full newscast here: