A Day in the Field (Jan. 5)

by Thalía González Torres

We started the day by going to the Ghaghas Center. There, we had some masala chai and separated ourselves into two groups.  The first group’s tasks consisted of collecting soil samples to measure the salinity and taking GPS coordinates of these sites. The other group visited eight different wells and collected various water-quality measurements: pH, salinity, TDS, specific conductivity, chlorophyll A, temperature, and dissolved oxygen. We used the Hydrolab and Solinst probe to gather the data.

While collecting this information, we were shocked to see the conditions of the wells they were using for drinking water.  There was a layer of sulfur film in one well, many were full of shoes and plastic bottles, and another had a strong odor.