Flooded Cambria pump could have spilled sewage — but it’s hard to tell since it’s underwater
Heavy rains flooded key infrastructure in Cambria, potentially causing sewage to be released in a neighborhood area of the northern San Luis Obispo County coastal town on Friday.
According to the San Luis Obispo County Public Health Department, an “unknown quantity of sewage” was released from a lift station at 2282 Burton Drive beginning just after 11 a.m.
The lift station is designed to pump wastewater from a lower elevation to a higher elevation.
Santa Rosa Creek waters completely covered the infrastructure on Friday morning, rendering access to the area impossible, according to John Allchin, Cambria Community Services District’s wastewater systems superintendent.
It’s unclear how much sewage may have been released from the lift station.
Cambria Community Services District General Manager Ray Dienzo said it was required to be reported as a spill because water flooded what’s known as a wet well, where sewage gets pumped from — but they won’t know how much sewage was spilled, if any at all, until after the water recedes.
Meanwhile, the health department said the release was “ongoing due to not being able to access the station under the water.”
The health department advised people to stay out of the Santa Rosa Creek flood waters in the meantime.
“Be advised that rainstorm runoff is known to transport high levels of disease-causing organisms such as bacteria, viruses and protozoa from the watershed and urban areas to the ocean,” the department said in the release.
Those organisms can cause skin, respiratory and intestinal problems, according to the release.
“Young children, older adults and people with compromised immune systems are especially vulnerable to these waterborne pathogens,” the release concluded.
This story was originally published March 10, 2023 at 4:06 PM.
