Divers go to a depth of 80 feet in raw sewage to unclog water system...

[Soloist]

Flushed wipes cause Charleston Water System backup

JAMES ISLAND, S.C. (WCBD) - Workers at the Charleston Water System Plum Island Facility had their hands full over the weekend when the system was clogged by a massive amount of wipes.

"It took a few days for us to get divers in here to actually dive down about 80 feet into raw sewage with their bare hands and feel around in total darkness," said Mike Saia, Communications Manager, Charleston Water System.

Those divers found mounds and mounds of flushed wipes. They clogged the system and caused a huge backup. While the system is clear now, there are still wipes around the facility from the overflow.

"They might do a lot of damage inside your home to your plumbing. They definitely do a lot of damage when they make their way through our infrastructure," said Saia.

When a wipe disappears down a toilet, so does your money. Maintenance is tied into your water rate and it costs a lot to clean messes like this.

One of the divers says going down into the wells is a big task.

"When you get down to the bottom, you can't see anything, everything is done by feel," said diver John Lares.

It's a lot of trouble that can be prevented by just throwing your wipes away.

"Hopefully with some new construction improvements we have here and some community education, we can get people to throw less and less wipes down into the toilet," Saia said.

When it comes down to it, only two things are supposed to be flushed down your toilet: human waste and toilet paper.

 

[Compressor]

S--t.

 

[Erich S]

yikes!

 

[Scuba J7]

The crappy job in this story is the guys that have to hose off the divers.

 

[Soloist]

Note to self:

Avoid all dive gear used in Charleston, South Carolina

 

[kafkaland]

I would hope "bare hands" is an exaggeration and they had dry gloves... plus a heavy duty Viking suit and a Superlite dive helmet. Then it's just another crappy day at work for a commercial diver.

 

[Rooster59]

PADI specialty course "Sh#& Diver", "Advanced Sh#& Diver"

Seriously, these guys should be installed in the Scuba Diving Hall of Fame.

 

[tomfcrist]

I saw EOD divers go into the poo pond in Kandahar to retrieve a dud mortar that Was lobbed onto the base. I was immediately convinced that EOD was not for me.

 

[ibj40]

How do I contribute here?

There's an old saying in the utilities industry: "We want to be #1 in the #2 business." These guys clearly retire that trophy.

My first Summer job was at a municipal wastewater treatment plant. At the headworks was a device known as the "rag screen". It's purpose was to intercept items that would give the primary treatment process problems (and I won't go into the details of how a wastewater treatment plant works in order to comply with discharge permit requirements).

That Summer, we assumed responsibility for a plant that served a former VA Hospital that had been converted to a female Job Corp center. The primary element clogging the rag screen every morning we showed up to service that plant was condoms. Feel free to draw your own conclusions.

Clearly the case in Charleston, and one that most of us in that industry are facing, is that the technology that was in place when the plant was built didn't anticipate the evolving hygiene trends of society.

Not sure how old the plant is, or the extent to which Charleston has maintained it to address these evolving issues, but notwithstanding the yuck factor, those guys have my vote as clearly being #1.

 

[Soloist]

I saw EOD divers go into the poo pond in Kandahar to retrieve a dud mortar that Was lobbed onto the base. I was immediately convinced that EOD was not for me.

Hazardous “duty” takes on a whole new meaning.