A bridge will be built over the stream gushing sewage in Gonubie to keep thousands of Discovery Surfers Challenge runners safe.
For six months, the wastewater treatment works receiving Gonubie and Mzamomhle’s sewage has been bypassing all incoming effluent and sending it down a once-picturesque stream in German Bay on the western side of Gonubie Point.
Details are scarce as Buffalo City metro has not responded to queries sent two weeks ago, but Off Track has been told the plant was vandalised by copper pipe thieves, lacked money for maintenance in the budget, and, Green Ripple public interest group believed there was a problem with paying a contractor.
One leader who has stepped up and is trying to drive the repair process is Gonubie’s DA councillor Valerie Knoetze, who said she visited the plant a few days ago “and the progress was good”.
“The reactor tank is cleaned and empty of the silt and sand, the diffusers are exposed and some will be replaced, then around the 16th [February], all should be well to calibrate everything to be on line and working.
“The new blower was bought a long time ago and will be online after the 16th, if all goes well.
“The other reactor with the sewage will then be transferred to this cleaned reactor so that the live bacteria can start to work.
“Then everything will start working and the sewage flowing into the river will stop and become grey water as it should be. The sewage running into the sea is raw sewage at the moment.
“But it should be a thing of the past after February 16 after thorough maintenance has been done and new parts bought and put online.
“We have had this issue since August, and this should be the end of it.
“For the Surfers Challenge it may be that a bridge is built just to be sure that all is safe as it will take a few days after the 16th for all to be clear and the discharge into the river to be grey water again.”
She said one of her understandings was that the budget to maintain the sewage system in general had not been made available “and that is why we are where we are”.
Off Track asked Discovery Surfers Challenge organiser Neville Wilkins what runners could expect on race day, February 21. “BCM is going to build a bridge across [it].”
Vaughn Driessel, who took Off Track to the polluted stream which flows hard and is a livid and stinky off-white colour, said there were more leaks further towards Gonubie Point.
He has shown Off Track three sewage spills, one from a pump station, two from storm drains. Now there is a fourth leak only about 200m from Gonubie Point. – Daily Dispatch
