The Region : High Coast DDT Level Told

Years of waste dumping into Los Angeles Harbor by a DDT manufacturer has left the San Pedro Canyon between the Palos Verdes Peninsula and Santa Catalina Island with the nation’s highest levels of the banned pesticide, according to a preliminary report on coastal waters prepared for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The study showed the count was 621 parts per billion. The water off Seal Beach and off San Diego Bay were also found to be among those with significant pollutants. The report said types of pollutants vary from place to place, ranging from trace metals to DDT and from sewage to the cancer-causing industrial chemical PCB. The harbor areas in Boston; Salem, Mass., and New York had the highest concentrations of pollutants. The agency sampled harbor sediments and fish around the nation in 1984.