Residents of a Chinese city were horrified on Monday when they discovered a river in their town had turned blood-red with a pungent smell.
Footage shows how bright red water burst out from a pipe at the side of the waterway and ran into the Lianxi river in Jiangxi Province, south-east China.
Local environmental bureau has investigated and traced the source of the pollution to a pig slaughterhouse up river.
Lianxi river, in south-east China, can be seen turned into a blood-red hue on September 12
According to People’s Daily Online, Lianxi river started to turn red near the Jiujiang College on the morning of September 12.
Students from the Jiujiang College told a reporter that the water was emitting a blood smell.
One student said: ‘The red coloured water is coming out from a pipe under the bridge near our school.’
A woman spoke in a Pear video that she had seen the river’s colour changed from blue to black, then to yellow and blood-red.
Lianxi Environmental Bureau took samples from the river and brought them back for investigation.
Officers traced the source of the pollution to a pig slaughterhouse upstream of the river and took sewage sample for test.
‘There is a blockage near the slaughterhouse’s sewage pipe, the sewage can be seen bursting out into the river,’ an officer spoke in a video reported by The Beijing News.
Local residents reported a smell of blood to the environmental bureau and bright red water can be seen flowing into the river from a pipe hole (left and right) in Jiujiang city
It’s believed that the pollution came from a pig slaughterhouse on the upper course of the river
A spokesperson explained to Pear that pigs’ blood had been diluted and treated under environmental protection before dumping in sewage.
He said the colour would not be as bright as those seen in the river.
Lianxi Environmental Bureau will carry out related actions according to the laws and regulations upon receiving the test results from the laboratory.
The discharge outlet of the sewage had already been fixed by the maintenance workers.
Web users were stunned as they wondered the number of pigs the slaughterhouse had killed.
‘Judging from the concentration of the blood in the water, how many pigs have they killed?’ A user named ‘Scluficer’ questioned.
Another web user ‘aloufi’ said: ‘Scary to see the amount of blood flowing into the river.’
People’s Daily Online stated that a similar incident happened in July, 2014.
The same river also turned red at that time. The pollution was later found to be caused by a leakage in the sewage pipes that came out from a slaughterhouse.