The rising sewage main on Norton Road (adjacent to the Ivel Springs Nature Reserve) burst Sunday 6th March sending pressurised raw sewage racing towards Ivel Springs for the third time in a year. The adjoining stables took the brunt of the flow and staff there initially
reported the incident. RevIvel representatives subsequently shared news of the incident extensively on social media, and had follow up conversations with Anglian Water and the EA.
Three breakages in one year leads to the conclusion that this aged section of pipe has been damaged – probably by the crushing forces exerted by the lorries/ vehicles using this stretch of road –exacerbated by the shallow depth of the pipe and indeed the axle-weight of the sewage-loaded tankers which attend the site whenever there is an incident. The thrust of our conversations with Anglian has been that they should carry out analysis to understand and confirm the underlying cause of the problem and implement a long-term solution as soon as possible.
Anglian advised the following Thursday that the (short term) fix has been delivered but the excavations have been left open to investigate an investment to ensure no recurrence. The use of “investment” sounds potentially quite promising.
Additionally, two senior members of the Anglian team are coming to the site early April to meet with Councillor Steve Jarvis and a handful of RevIvel representatives. Discussion points so far include:
Long term solution for this section of pipe
Pollution monitoring for the upper Ivel e.g., ammonia – also nitrates, phosphates etc
Misconnections: are where foul effluents from sources like toilets are incorrectly plumbed into the surface water pipes (which discharge directly into the environment) or run off water is plumbed into the wastewater systems (where in the event of heavy rain, the sewage system cannot cope, and sewage discharges take place under licence).
An area of foul ponding and subsurface pollution due to breaks in the sewers and misconnections has accumulated near the Ivel Springs pumping station (part of the wetland area proposed by Affinity Water/Five Rivers).
We will be seeking Anglian Water’s proposals for fixing misconnections, and how they intend to clean up the accumulated contamination of the access track & area around the pumping station where the biohazards from these broken pipes have accumulated.