Oregon Public Broadcasting

Federal and state scientists are researching the windsurfers' ailment known as Rivernose. As Christy George reports, what started as a rural legend on an internet site has become a high-tech mystery.

The Columbia River Gorge is a major transportation route for trains, cars and barges - and it's provided water to aluminum plants, pulp and paper mills, the Hanford nuclear reservation and irrigated agriculture.

But the heaviest industries have yielded to tourism and recreation - to windsurfers like Ben Young.

Ben Young: "I'm here for the summer and I go in probably 3/4 days in summers - 4/5 days a week."

For several years, windsurfers and kiteboarders have been complaining about gastro-intestinal and skin problems, and persistent sinus infections.

Last summer, some of them complained to the Columbia Riverkeeper group and blogged about their ailments.

Last summer, the Oregon Department of Human Services did a one-day survey, and concluded there could be a problem.

And this summer, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency joined the hunt to find out what's in Columbia River water.

So volunteers spent an August weekend fanning out on both sides of the river, from Arlington to Cascade Locks.

We caught up with Rachel Pecore of the Columbia Riverkeeper in Lyle, Washington.

Rachel Pecore: "If there were any wind today, you'd see a colorful array of sails right now. It's really a sight to see."

Rachel Pecore: "This is sample #7. We've been to several different public access sites on the Columbia Gorge today and we're wading in about a meter deep and filling up bottles of water essentially."

Windsurfers aren't the only river users who wonder what's in the water.

Levi Martin: "Right now looking on the steelhead...."

Levi Martin's been fishing the river for decades.

Christy George: "Do you eat the fish?"

Levi Martin: "Oh yes."

Christy George: "Is it good?"

Levi Martin: "Oh yeah. Probably 70% of our diet is fish, the wife and I."

When Rachel Pecore was taking water samples, Levi Martin was hauling his boat out of the river - and they got to talking.

Levi Martin: "I kinda volunteer, being Old Mother Nag."

Rachel Pecore: "The more people we have on the river, watching the river, the faster we can get it cleaned up."

Levi Martin: "The creator put us here to maintain not destroy it. I'd like see it left that way when I go."

The Riverkeeper team invited Levi Martin to join up, and then delivered their samples to the EPA's mobile lab.

Two EPA microbiologists came down from Seattle.

Stephanie Harris explains as her colleague runs each sample through four different filters looking for four different bacteria.

Stephanie Harris: "The bacteria we're trying to isolate is on that filter that she's transferring onto the media."

The range of symptoms people report is complicating the hunt - chronic post-nasal drip - the so-called Rivernose - but also nausea, diarrhea and cuts and sores that just won't heal.

The volunteers also surveyed windsurfers - and so did we.

Ben Young is surfing the Columbia all summer.

Christy George: "What have you ever experienced?"

Ben Young: "Nothing. And I don't hear that much about it, either. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist of course, you know."

Paul's been here since May 15th.

Paul: "I've been here every day and I splash a lot//and I'm really allergic to a lot of things, cats and a lot of spring allergies. And nothing here."

Rachel Pecore's not surprised.

Rachel Pecore: "There's people who are fine, totally fine, they're skeptical, you know, 'crybabies essentially out there,' and to the other end of the spectrum, there are people who don't use the river anymore - won't touch the Columbia again."

That describes Sheridan Low.

He nicked his left arm and ended up in the hospital with a nasty infection in his tendon.

Sheridan Low: "It was all really inflamed and swollen and hurt whenever I moved it, and there were like cuts on my hands and wrists, they were like have you been in the river recently?"

Christy George: "I assume you still go in?"

Sheridan Low: "Oh yeah, I just came out of the river."

The first lab results will come from the state in October, and from the EPA in November.

Online:

http://yosemite.epa.gov/r10/ecocomm.nsf/Columbia/Columbia