Sewage leaking into rivers slowed

Tuesday, Jan. 18, 2005 | 9:31 a.m.

Sewage is still leaking into the rivers that empty into Lake Mead, but not as much as had been for about a week, a Utah water official said Monday night.

Walt Baker, director of the Utah Water Quality Division, said all four of the major sewage breaks in the Santa Clara River six miles north of St. George were shunted by noon Monday, about a week after the spill first began.

But, he said, it will take a few more days for workers to patch every leak in the sewerage lines, which were damaged during last week's flooding. He estimates that 5,000 to 10,000 gallons of sewage water is still leaking into the river.

Utah and Nevada officials estimated that the four major breaks -- a 36-inch rupture, a 30-inch break, an 18-inch gap and a 10-inch hole -- had been dumping about 1.5 million gallons of contaminated water into the river each day.

One of the breaks was where the Santa Clara River converges with the Virgin River, which in turn runs into Lake Mead, the source of 90 percent of Southern Nevada's water.

A health advisory for those rivers will remain in effect at least through today, Baker said, to give the rivers enough time to flush the contaminated water out of the system.

If lab tests show that the bacteria in the rivers have diluted back to normal levels, the advisory will be removed, Baker said.

Southern Nevada Water Authority officials said the contaminated water should not affect the quality of local drinking water because the bacteria would be diluted by the rivers and by the size and the depth of Lake Mead.

As a precaution, the water authority did increase the frequency of its water quality monitoring and the level of ozone disinfection at its two water treatment facilities.