Swampscott pumping station crisis over

SWAMPSCOTT – Town officials said Tuesday the pump station crisis is over, but the cleanup continues while they try to figure out the cause of a “catastrophic failure” at the town’s wastewater pumping station.The failure has required the installation of an alternate pumping system to bypass the pumping station while a separate system continues to drain an 18-foot-deep pool of raw sewage that flooded the building early Sunday morning.”Two pumps came in from New Jersey and the pumping house and separator are completely bypassed,” Selectman Richard Malagrifa said while surveying the station on Tuesday. “We’re out of the crisis, now it’s just a matter of draining the building.”The Humphrey Street pumping station collects all of the town’s sewage – approximately 2 million gallons on a day with heavy rain – and then uses three pumps to pump it to Lynn’s wastewater treatment plant, according to Director of Public Works Gino Cresta.Workers responding to an alarm at the building on 7:30 a.m. Sunday found that the lowest level of the building, three stories below ground where the three pumps are located, was completely flooded. As the day continued, the flood waters rose to be about three feet deep on the story above, Maylor reported Monday afternoon, as more wastewater came through.Nine tanker trucks began a continuous relay of hauling the town’s sewage from the Humphrey Street site to Lynn’s wastewater treatment facility on Commercial Street, and only a few residents in the immediate area reported temporary disruptions of sewer service, Maylor told selectmen.The trucks continued running Tuesday and possibly today.But larger pumps were needed to accommodate the sewer flow as well as to drain the building in order to examine the equipment and determine the cause of the failure.Each of the pumps from New Jersey – the second pump is on backup – can pump approximately 5 million gallons of water a day, Maylor said.Meanwhile, town officials throughout Monday and Tuesday praised Cresta, Maylor, workers from Veolia Water, the company which manages the facility, and employees of the town’s public works department who have been working long hours since Sunday morning to ensure that most residents have no interruption in sewer services.”It’s one of the most unusual things,” Selectman Jill Sullivan said of the failure. “The fact that nobody has any idea that it’s happening, and that the service level is being maintained is just an incredible testament to the DPW, Town Administrator and their hard work.”Maylor and other town officials reiterated Monday night and Tuesday that they didn’t know how much the pump station’s failure would cost the town until they determined the cause of the failure and examined insurance policies and contracts with Veolia and other companies.But Tuesday, several officials said they were glad that the situation hadn’t been worse.”It’s really a catastrophic failure,” said Selectmen Chair Matthew Strauss. “But we’ve so far had minimal impact to the residents which I think is key ? can you imagine if we had stuff back up into homes all over town?”Maylor said he was just glad that last week’s weather forecast proved inaccurate. “Thankfully, we didn’t have five straight days of rain,” he said.