PERSPECTIVE ON THE ENVIRONMENT : Biological Hiroshima on the River : We need better regulation of toxic pesticides. But real safety lies in reducing their use.

Dunsmuir. The name of the place deservedly evokes images of Scotland. This section of the Upper Sacramento River, one of the last almost-free-flowing stretches of water in the state, was until Sunday one of our last blue-ribbon native trout fisheries.

Today, it is a biological Hiroshima.

Thousands of fish--10-pound wild trout!--countless ducks, river otters, insects and other life forms were killed by a 19,500-gallon pesticide spill from a derailed train.

Officials are still trying to determine what caused the derailment Sunday night, but the facts now available demonstrate again how vulnerable we are to ultra-toxic chemicals, and how fate or accident or carelessness can knock to pieces our efforts to shield ourselves and the environment from harm.

A 97-car Southern Pacific train was en route from Long Beach to Pasco, Wash. Only 11 cars were loaded and only one contained hazardous materials. Seven cars and one engine jumped the tracks. Only one car fell into the river, but it was full of the pesticide Vapam, or metam-sodium, a fumigant used before crop planting to kill insects, weeds and fungi in soil--in other words, everything.

The first official record of the spill on Sunday night read “creek name unknown”-- this for a river that ultimately becomes drinking water for 22 million Californians. Until noon Monday, the state Office of Emergency Services thought that just 1,000 gallons of the pesticide had spilled. Officials did not think that the chemical was toxic because the tank car carried no warning, which federal law requires when substances classified as hazardous are being transported. Only when fish started dying did officials learn otherwise.

This winding canyon section of track has been the scene of other derailments. In 1976, a similar accident resulted in a chemical spill and serious fish kills. State records show eight “major derailments” in the area between 1981 and 1989, though with less-serious consequences.

Perhaps the consequences of even Sunday’s spill would not have been so severe if this chemical had been named a hazardous substance by the Department of Transportation. Then the tank car would have been labeled and emergency response presumably would have been more effective. It is almost impossible to believe that a pesticide designed to kill all living organisms in soil has not been classified as hazardous.

Metam-sodium belongs to a pesticide family with an ugly history. Soil fumigants are notorious for their toxicity-- others including DBCP, EDB and Telone II have all been outlawed because of carcinogenicity. The use of metam-sodium has increased as these other chemicals have been banned. Metam-sodium breaks down almost immediately on contact with water into hydrogen sulfide and methyl isothiocyanate, or MITC, which is extremely irritating to skin, eyes and the respiratory system. It is a less-potent cousin of methyl isocyanate, which killed more than 2,000 people at Bhopal, India, in 1984. Available studies seem to indicate that MITC does not cause cancer, reproductive toxicity or other chronic hazards to humans. That is good news for the Californians who may receive this chemical in their drinking water. But what about a state wild trout fishery--already plundered by water diversions and dams--that has just suffered the worst single-day-loss in its history? And miles of wild-river ecology killed off literally bank-to-bank?

There are old lessons here that we should already have learned. The federal transportation safety regulations failed to protect public health and the environment from this toxic chemical, just as they failed to protect Alaska from the Exxon Valdez. Many other toxic chemicals are transported daily throughout this country, through far more populous areas. Certainly the transportation regulatory system needs immediate scrutiny and probably a serious overhaul.

It has been reported that more than 20 state and federal government agencies were involved in the response to this spill. Lack of communication and coordination resulted in serious delays. Perhaps if the one-day-old California Environmental Protection Agency had been born last year, the response to this spill would have been more effective.

But the fundamental lesson of the Dunsmuir spill is that pesticides, no matter how tightly regulated or controlled, can be fiendishly toxic. These compounds, designed to kill or control unwanted pests, be they insects, weeds, fungi or rodents, are lethal by definition.

A few mementos from the past: In the late 1970s, DBCP caused male workers at a California manufacturing facility to become sterile. In 1985, 1,000 people were sickened by illegal residues of the pesticide aldicarb in watermelons. Nearly 1,500 drinking-water wells in California’s Central Valley are unusable because of continuing high levels of DBCP. Nationwide, at least 46 pesticides have been found in the ground water of 26 states. But we continue to apply billions of pounds of pesticides in our fields, parks, schools and homes.

The time has come to recognize that no level of government regulation will prevent all of the health and environmental problems potentially caused by pesticides. Instead, we must, and we can, reduce our dependence on these deadly chemicals through alternative pest management. The change must take place on America’s farms, but the rest of us can make ourselves heard in the supermarket, demanding foods with fewer or no pesticides and understanding that the occasional cosmetic blemish is the sign of safer fruits and vegetables. These actions may seem inconsequential, but unless consumer concerns about pesticides are clearly and strongly expressed, this devastating accident will be repeated.