Toxic Gumbo

The waterway linking Gulf Coast oil with the refineries of Baton Rouge has brought great prosperity to Louisiana. But the people living in “Cancer Alley” have a different story to tell.

Text by Michael Stahl

A little more than a century ago, down a winding, serviceable waterway between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, there was an abundance of green along its shores. Sugarcane stalks matured ten-feet high, and glistening men freely harvested their livelihoods here. When the yellow sun peaked and their arms tired, they’d cut open a stem and suck the clear, energizing nectar. Beyond them, the Mississippi River stretched a mile wide, appearing any number of colors depending on the tide and the time of day. Rickety boats glided past the farmers, puffing white clouds of nothing but hot water that dissipated after a brief stint in the air.

What those fieldworkers likely didn’t know was that thousands of feet underneath them and in the depths of a sprawling gulf a few hundred miles south were countless salt domes storing immeasurable amounts of black oil about to be discovered.