All coastal beaches in Long Beach have been closed after at least 108,000 gallons of sewage entered the Los Angeles River Monday when a sewage pipe broke in downtown Los Angeles, city health officials announced.
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Fix crews managed to stop the leak by evening but the pipe split again on Tuesday, sending sewage into the Los Angeles River which carried it into the Pacific.
The leak released about 900 gallons per minute, adding up to about 1.5 million gallons of raw sewage by Tuesday morning, according to Long Beach environmental health officials. Health officials are now testing the water there, and beaches will be reopened tests indicate the the water is safe for swimming.
A huge sewage spill near downtown L.A. could contaminate Seal Beach, Huntington Beach, Sunset Beach and Palos Verdes.
“This initial round of testing looks really good, for the most part”.
“We had tankers working all night”, he said. A bypass system is being built to divert sewage around the break so repairs and cleanup can get underway.
But by Tuesday, officials estimated about 2.4 million gallons had spewed out of the pipe.
“Just pure disappointment”, beachgoer Francisco Aleman of Lake Elsinore told KABC-TV.
The top of a sewer pipe collapsed Monday afternoon, forcing it to overflow and belch a stinky sludge onto streets and into the Los Angeles River.
“Nobody went out”, owner Michael Pless said.
Though the spill took place some 20 miles from the harbor, officials closed the beaches fearing the sewage could flow down the riverbed, into the harbor and to the ocean. “I had people flying in to meet me”.
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