Television Documentary
To Explore
Cape Fear River Issues
Otters swim in it, cities drink
from it and discharge their treated
waste waters into it. Bald eagles fly
along its shores, pelicans nest on its
islands and fertilizers flow into it. It
cools nuclear rectors and industrial
processes.
The Cape Fear River is all these
things and more. Even before it is
the Cape Fear, the river meanders its
way through Guiiford County tc the
southwest where it is called the Haw
River and Rockingham County to
the north where it is called the Deep
River. Along its 200-mile journey to
the Atlantic, it winds through 29
North Carolina counties, intermin
gling with dozens of smaller rivers,
tributaries, swamps and finally
winding through one of the major
estuaries of the east coast.
At various points it is navigable
only by canoe or Jon boat, yet it
widens an>' deepens steadily until it
welcomes ocean-going freighters at
the port of Wilmington.
Despite its obvious importance to
North Carolina, relatively little is
known about the Cape Fear River.
Dr. James Mcrritt, director of the
Center for Marine Science Research
at UNC-Wilmington, said, "If you
ask me if the water is clean, is it safe
to drink. I'll have to say: 'Yes. Well,
I think so. Maybe. I really don't
know because there are so many fac
tors affecting water quality.'"
Mcrritt is working to eliminate
that data gap and to bring to fruition
the Cape Fear River Program, a citi
zen-funded. long-term research and
monitoring program on the river.
Mcrritt said there is no lack of data
on water quality, simply the absence
of a coordinated manner in which to
collect and interpret the data.
Government agencies and busi
nesses which are required to collect
data do so using varying strategies.
"All the samples may show clean
water, but these samples are taken at
different times using different sam
pling methods. To be realistic, sam
pling has to take into account tidal
flow, has to be taken at the same
time on a consistent schedule and by
the same methods over a long ex
pancj nf (Kp riyjr^ Kg cajrl Pnr any
action considered along the river
basin, "we need to know how that
action will affect the river. We need
to have definitive answers, and
that's what the plan is designed to
give us."
As a first step in this emerging
Cape Fear River Program, UNCW
has produced a documentary exam
ining a three-day journey down the
river by university scientists.
Traveling with a film crew from
N.C. State University's Broadcast
Services, they examine the river's
ecosystem, its history and some of
the many (jucy.tions which
arisen as the state government and
industry consider the river's future.
Scheduled to air at 9 p.m.
Monday, June 13 on University of
North Carolina "Television, "River
Run: Down the Cape Fear River to
the Sea." describes the river's rela
tionship with its wildlife, discusses
various sources of possible pollu
tion, describes examples of success
ful utilization of the river as a re
source, and more. It also asks more
questions than it answers, including:
Can the river support additional de
velopment and residential and indus
trial growth without harm to its
ecosystem, particularly the viiai pri
mary nursery area at the mouth of
the Cape Fear? The answer now.
says Merritt. is, "We don't know."
The program has received major
funding from AAI and CP&L.
Contributions from these and other
companies and individuals will go
toward hiring a full-time director fot
the Cape Fear River Program and to
develop and implement the monitor
ing plan. Working with business
leaders and government regulatory
personnel to develop a plan for long
term. consistent monitoring, the uni
versity's goal is to provide reliable
water quality indicators and fish
population health indicators.
The plan's scope covers the entire
Cape Fear River Basin which in
cludes the various streams, tribu
taries and wetlands on either side of
the Cape Fear, Haw and Deep rivers,
because what happens on one end of
the river affects life forms and river
health all the way down the basin.
The cities of Cary and Apex take
their drinking water from the Cape
Fear through Jordan Lake and dis
charge the treated wastewater into
the Ncuse River. This affects the
flow of both the Cape Fear and the
Neuse.
"1 see the availability of drinking
water as being an increasingly im
portant political issue," says UNCW
Chancellor James Leutze. "We've
seen the issue of inter-basin transfer
played out internally between the
U.S. and Mexico and stateside, par
ticularly in our west with the
Colorado River and the Rio
Grande."
Leutze said that as populations
grow, the need for water increases
and elected officials have the need
to provide water in the most cost-ef
fective manner possible. With Wake
County's population expected to
grow more than 20 percent this
decade, the possibility of pulling
more water from the Cape Fear and
"shunting the water into the nearest
tributary which may not be back into
the original river system" becomes
more obvious. The research process
will initially cover the area from the
ocean to Lock & Dam *1 ana the
Northeast Cape Fear up to Castle
Hayne. "We can't possibly monitor
the entire river from one end of it,"
Merritt said, "so we'll be working
with other organizations along the
river to put the plan in place basin
wide."
Interest in the Cape Fear and
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North Carolina's other rivers is so
great that the Oregon -based advoca
cy group. River Network, lists 69
North Carolina groups and individu
als, many of them along the Cape
Fear, working to safeguard river
quality and to promote the river as a
multi-use resource. Ninety-four such
groups in the basin counties are list
ed by the UNC-CH School of Public
Health.
The long-term solution to many
of the river's potential problems is
"to educate the cnizcnry to the bio
logical systems and processes such
that they understand our relationship
to the river," Merritt said.
"Fishermen need the river; indus
tries need the rivers to operate and
citizens need the industries for jobs.
Most of us get our drinking water
from the river. If we understand
these things, we won't trash the re
source."
~ sr/^'moTo rr sus^usmh
From Beech To Beach
Academically gifted eighth grade students from Valle Cruris and Cove Creek schools in Watauga County, where the view includes Beech
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