An oil spill that contaminated the water supply for parts of three states kept some 22,000 children out of school temporarily last week.
School districts in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia canceled classes or adopted other conservation measures following the collapse of an Ashland Oil Company diesel-fuel tank Jan. 2 that polluted the water along the Monongahela and Ohio rivers.
Environmental Protection Agency officials in Pittsburgh said they could not predict when the spill would dissipate and water-pumping rates would return. Some schools remained closed late last week.
