Council Bluffs Releases Raw Sewage into Missouri River

[ChadJK]

Council Bluffs received permission from the Iowa DNR to release raw sewage into the Missouri River so they could inspect a sewage line. They released 68,510 gallons of untreated sewage into the river yesterday morning.

Surely there has to be another way to do this. How do cities with no river, large lake, or ocean nearby work on their sewage infrastructure? Should major metro have holding tanks on standby for things like this?

It's probably a regular occurrence, but still disgusting to contemplate.

[nebugeater]

Council Bluffs received permission from the Iowa DNR to release raw sewage into the Missouri River so they could inspect a sewage line. They released 68,510 gallons of untreated sewage into the river yesterday morning.

Surely there has to be another way to do this. How do cities with no river, large lake, or ocean nearby work on their sewage infrastructure? Should major metro have holding tanks on standby for things like this?

It's probably a regular occurrence, but still disgusting to contemplate.

Don't even think back to the summer of 2011 if this is disgusting.

[nebugeater]

For yesterday the Missouri river flow at Omaha was about 54,000 cu ft/sec
1 Cu ft/sec is about 448 GPM
so
That equals 24,192,000 GPM
1,451,520,000 gallons per hour

I will give you that it is not ideal but in terms of the impact, it is really nothing. If that was all released in one hour it is 0.0047 % of the flow for an hour. Probably swimming pools that are more contaminated than this impact on the river!

[ChadJK]

That's like a waiter not washing his hands after using the bathroom and then refilling your drinks. Sure, he had a little poop on his hand and it got on the pitcher, but the PPM of feces in your ice water is almost negligible. lol

[bigredmed1]

That's like a waiter not washing his hands after using the bathroom and then refilling your drinks. Sure, he had a little poop on his hand and it got on the pitcher, but the PPM of feces in your ice water is almost negligible. lol

No it is more like a waiter who had fecal material all over his hands, then went back to the can, and didn’t wash that poop particle away. The Mo is the definition of contaminated even as it leaves Gavin’s point. Adding that amount of sewage, disgusting as it is, is pretty trivial.

[nebugeater]

That's like a waiter not washing his hands after using the bathroom and then refilling your drinks. Sure, he had a little poop on his hand and it got on the pitcher, but the PPM of feces in your ice water is almost negligible. lol

hay, at least it's organic!

[Omahacritic]

For yesterday the Missouri river flow at Omaha was about 54,000 cu ft/sec
1 Cu ft/sec is about 448 GPM
so
That equals 24,192,000 GPM
1,451,520,000 gallons per hour

I will give you that it is not ideal but in terms of the impact, it is really nothing. If that was all released in one hour it is 0.0047 % of the flow for an hour. Probably swimming pools that are more contaminated than this impact on the river!

Thanks for the perspective. I was wondering this very thing.

0 is always better, but it isn’t always possible.