Crystal Stroud Calls DEP Investigation "A Joke"

Susan Phillips

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Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

July 8, 2011 | 1:07 PM

The Bradford County woman who says she was poisoned by gas drilling activity near her home says the recent report by the Department of Environmental Protection looks like the work of an elementary school student. Here’s what Stroud had to say to State Impact PA:

They had released my water results to the press before I even had received them in an e-mail. They tested for 10 substances in my water while all my other results have at least 20 diffferent substances. They released a statement saying they did isotopic testing yet didn’t release the results of that testing and still cannot produce results as proof. It’s a joke!

Crystal Stroud has become an outspoken critic of gas drilling after she says she experienced slurred speech, dizziness, and hairloss. Her independent blood and water tests showed high levels of barium, along with radiological materials. Stroud links her symptoms with gas drilling. But the DEP report says gas drilling is not the cause of her illness. The report says the area of Bradford County where Stroud lives has had historically high levels of barium in the aquifer.
Chief Oil and Gas refers to a 1998 report by the U.S. Geological Survey, and their own pre-drill test results, to prove that the barium existed long before they drilled for natural gas.