And they want boaters to control their waste water?

[Jim Seamans]

This is about 8 miles south of Washington,DC and feeds directly into the Potomac River. No health concern BUT stay out of the water. I hope it is diluted by the time it gets to us 70 miles down river.Jim--------------LAUREL, Md. -- Authorities said power is back up at a Prince George's County pumping station where more than 1 million gallons of wastewater overflowed after electricity outages.Authorities said power went out at the Broad Creek Pumping Station in Fort Washington on Saturday during severe thunderstorms.That outage caused about 1 million gallons of untreated, diluted wastewater to run off into Broad Creek.Another outage occurred early Sunday as Pepco crews were working at the site, prompting another sewer overflow. It was unclear how many gallons seeped out.John C. White, spokesman for the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission, said there are no health concerns at this point, but signs are posted in the area warning people to stay out of the affected waters for 30 days.

 

[Ross]

seepage seems to be a variable term.

If I have a seepage on my boat I can clean it up with a sponge. If a sewage treatment plant shuts down and the waste water overflows the tanks apparently that is also a seepage.

 

[Rob]

Let it flow...

Some towns along the Jersey Shore still have pipes that literally dump waste hundreds of yards from the beach. When it rains most wastewater treatment plants can't handle the extra volume in the sewers, so guess where it goes? Right into the rivers and streams...without being treated. I think more sewage gets dumped each year by wastewater treatment plants then by all the boaters.

 

[Shell]

Sewerage

Same problem in NY harbor.After a heavy rain, the street waste gets sweep into the harbor, the Sewer authorities, if overloaded, release into the water.The water is cleaner than it was 40 years ago with EPA rules in effect and now with the World Trade Center gone.Did you know the WTC was one the largest polluters of the NY Harbor?The Port Authority of NY & NJ, a quasi/ government agency are not subject to health or building codes.We all have to do are part but it seems like in the last 8 years the agencies that are responsible for the health of our waters and ultimately the health of us have done little.SH

 

[KorculaChris]

For Ross:

The reason that our drips (seepage) and waste treatment plant million-gallon overflow (seepage) is simply one of spelling. Waste treatment liquid is a mixture of water and urine (pee). Someone Spoonerized the word "pee-age" and got "seepage". ;D

 

[larry w]

In SoCal, Catalina Island years ago started placing dye

tablets into the MSD of visiting boats, then, telling you to flush the head, they would circle your boat looking for the flourescent green or yellow dye. If they found any, then or hours later, they'd kick the offending boat out and put that boat name on a list and that boat was banned for a year. They couldn't figure out why their bacteria count was still so high, until someone noticed the "seepage" coming from under the main street and running into the bay right next to the beach. Turns out their whole sewer system was leaking like the proverbial sieve. Another case of boaters being blamed for land-based pollution. Why can't the scientists (?) realize that the reported levels of pollution are way too high to be caused by boats? It's because boaters are easy, PC targets. The city of Newport Beach is trying to blame boats for the high pollution of Newport Bay, apparently ignoring all that farm and urban run-off flowing into the water. Makes you wonder, who's getting paid off?