Sewage slams Swampscott plant

SWAMPSCOTT – Officials said they don’t know the cause of a “catastrophic failure” at the town’s wastewater pump station Sunday morning that flooded two floors of the building with raw sewage and prompted a constant relay of trucks on Humphrey Street to transport the town’s wastewater to Lynn.”To residents and businesses we’re hoping it isn’t (a big deal), but on an operational aspect, yes it’s a big deal,” said Town Administrator Andrew Maylor on Monday afternoon. “Until such time as we (reduce the flooding) we can’t identify the problem ? our primary goal is to have no impact on the lives of residents – either when driving on Humphrey Street or in their homes, but it will be some number of hours before we can assess the equipment.”Maylor said that sewage had been reported as backing up into a few homes in the station’s immediate area, but as of Monday afternoon, no residents’ or businesses’ wastewater services were reported affected by the failure. The town is in the midst of a $300,000 contract to upgrade the pumps and infrastructure of the sewer system, Maylor said, and he said he thinks this was the system’s first catastrophic failure.The Humphrey Street pumping station collects all of the town’s sewage and then uses three pumps to move that wastewater to Lynn for treatment. Director of Public Works Gino Cresta said that 2 million gallons of sewage comes into the plant each day. At 7:30 a.m. Sunday, an alarm indicated a problem at the station and workers responding to the alarm found that the lowest level of the building – three stories below ground where the three pumps are located – was completely flooded, Maylor said. As the day continued, the flood waters rose to be about three feet deep on the story above, Maylor said.Lynn Water and Sewer responded with a pump so they could pump sewage coming into the building into a fleet of nine trucks that could deliver the wastewater to the Lynn plant for treatment.”As far as any impact on Lynn, we’re handling it without any interruption of services,” said Lynn Water and Sewer Chief Engineer Anthony Marino. “They’re just moving (the sewage) by truck instead of by pipe.”But a larger capacity pump is needed to handle the incoming flow plus reduce the flooding in the station, Maylor said. And until that pump arrived on Monday evening and cleared the lower floors, the town could not determine the cause of the problem.But Maylor said that there were indications that the station’s pumps appeared to be working and that the problem occurred somewhere after the wastewater was pumped into a pipe flowing to Lynn.Until the problem is discovered and fixed, however, the trucks will continue traveling between Swampscott and the city of Lynn’s treatment plant on Commercial Street.Maylor said he couldn’t speculate on how long fixing the problem might take or the cost of the incident to the town.”Right now we’re making sure we stay up with the flow and eliminating any impact on residents,” he said Monday afternoon. “In terms of issues on responsibility and cost, there will be plenty of time to sort that out.”