Orange sludge leaking from the Trench Camp Mine near Patagonia, Ariz.

((AP Photo/Arizona Republic, Gooch Goodwin))

When record breaking rain from former Hurricane Norbert and Hurricane Odile moved into the Southwest last month, residents of Patagonia, Arizona, might have expected local waterways to flood, but they definitely didn't expect them to turn orange.

But that's exactly what happened just outside the sleepy Santa Cruz County town after two local abandoned mines flooded and sent a surge of toxic substances into creeks in the area. Tuscon's KMSB Fox 11 details how, Gooch Goodwin, a member of the local conservation group the Patagonia Area Resource Alliance (PARA), stumbled upon the orange flow while on a hike weeks ago.

"It's dangerous and it's getting in our waterways," Goodwin told the station.

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Teams from the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) traced the spill back to two abandoned mines: Trench Camp Mine (closed in the 1960s) and Lead Queen Mine (closed in the 1940s). Both mines flooded from an accumulation of rain from Norbert in early September and Odile just 10 days later. Nearby Nogales, Arizona, received 4.43 inches of rain during September, more than 2 inches of which came from Odile-related rainfall on September 17.

Initial water quality tests revealed that the pH levels in Alum Gulch Creek dropped substantially to levels of 1 to 3, indicating an increase in acidity in the waterway, the Arizona Republic reports. And more recent tests show that the orange waterways contain aluminum, iron, silicon, sulfur and manganese, though the exact concentrations of the substances in waterways in the area has not yet been released, according to Floyd Gray of the USGS.

Gray told the Arizona Republic that residents and experts alike have never seen local waterways run orange before.

"That's why everybody freaked," Gray told the Arizona Republic. "We've never seen it like that anywhere in the mountain."

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But the 130 abandoned mines in the Patagonia mountains, particularly Trench Camp Mine, have a history of environmental problems in the area. The Associated Press reports that Arizona sought legal action against Asarco, the owner of Trench Camp Mine (and others across the area), in the past, leading to a settlement that delegated nearly $3 million toward cleaning up Trench Camp Mine and another mine back in 2009. A multistate trust now runs the mine, including Asarco, the Arizona Republic reports.

Now, ADEQ issued five violations to the trust for the current problems, including a failure to control and document the discharge from the flooded Trench Camp Mine in a timely manner. ADEQ said that they weren't aware that Trench Camp Mine's owners had done anything yet to rectify the mine's problems. If the owners don't do anything to fix the mine's issues soon, they could face legal action from Arizona.

For the immediate future, the U.S. Forest service is working to stop the polluted material from reaching Sonoita Creek, which flows directly into Patagonia Lake, a popular recreational destination, but more importantly, stop the contaminants from entering groundwater where the residents of Patagonia draw their drinking water.

"If it got badly polluted it would be a serious problem," Patagonia town manager David Teel told Tuscon News Now.

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