Update
Contractors with the City of Williams Lake have temporarily fixed a sewage leak in the River Valley.
Gary Muraca, Director of Municipal Services gave this updated report on the work that was done.
“This morning with the help of a helicopter we got a crew over to the island side as well as on the riverbank side to make sure that if we plugged the leak we wouldn’t be flooding out the Lagoons or flooding out our infrastructure on the other side. So far today we were successful, we have that line plugged now and the water is going where it should be going”.
Muraca added, “It’s not ideal right now because we still haven’t made that repair but now it’s back to the point of it being pre-treated sewage going into the river rather than raw sewage”.
“This is a big win. We can focus on getting the main line repaired”, Muraca said.
(Original story)
Contractors with the City of Williams Lake are attempting today to plug a leak in the City sewer line that had resulted in untreated sewage flowing into the Fraser River.
The sewage is being released from an overflow upstream of the Sewage Treatment Lagoons in the River Valley.
Crews confirmed the leak yesterday and worked late into the night in an attempt to repair it and divert the sewage through the pre-treatment process.
The work is anticipated to be completed today and BC’s Emergency Coordination Centre, Ministry of Environment, and Department of Fisheries and Oceans have been notified.
Gary Muraca, Director of Municipal Services said, “Crews are working as fast as they can to fix this situation and get back to normal operations. Once we get this done, we can focus on getting the main line repaired”.
The City said the leak is in addition to a ruptured pipe further down the line which has yet to be repaired as crews are having difficulty accessing the site.
Sewage released from that pipe is pre-treated.
The municipal water supply has not been affected.
The State of Local Emergency has been extended by the City for another seven days due to the flooding and erosion which has washed out sections of the River Valley Road.
Something going on in the Cariboo you think people should know about?
Send us a news tip by emailing [email protected].
