Update on North River treatment plant overflow - 6:47pm 21 July 2011

a little more info from riverkeeper.  thanks again to phillip musegaas.

most up to date list of outfalls is below his email.
sorry to be the bearer of bad news to quite a few people who were on the water last night from pier 66, but note that one of the outfalls is right AT west 26th street. 
nb

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Phillip Musegaas
Date: Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 6:47 PM
Subject: RE: update on North River treatment plant overflow

Nancy and Rob,

Thanks for the emails today – here's what I know at this point, some of it's probably old news but I thought I'd share anyway.  Feel free to call or email me with questions or ideas.  The plant permit is attached, which has the list of CSO outfalls, some of which are being used for this bypass.  Let me know if you want me to send a list of the outfalls and GPS coordinates.

Here is a link to the statement on our website – I'm going to update it tomorrow morning.

http://www.riverkeeper.org/blog/2011/07/21/nyc-sewage-treatment-plant-dumping-raw-sewage-into-hudson-after-fire

-          DEC confirmed that the inflow is being diverted to at least seven permitted CSO outfalls, located along the west side of Manhattan from Dyckman street down to 18^th street, and on the Harlem River at Academy St. and W. 203^rd st.   hypochlorite is being added to the discharge at 158^th street, but that's the only treatment occurring, and Larry Levine reminded me that it's known to be not very effective and possibly more harm than good to aquatic life.  This is a key point we need to get out to the public, that this is not one big discharge happening from the plant, but sewage discharges all along the west side of Manhattan, and at least two locations on the Harlem River.

-          DEP predicts that 120 million gallons have been discharged since yesterday at 515 pm, when the bypass began – this matches up with the avg. flow of the plant, not actual field measurements of flow.  If they don't get the plant up and running by tomorrow, they are expecting to announce beach closures by tomorrow afternoon, not sure which ones though.

-          The Riverkeeper boat is taking samples at the outfall locations today, and will head down tomorrow to resample.  We just finished a sampling run about a week ago, also dry weather – early results from that run show acceptable water quality in every sampling location except Gowanus.   I'll share sample results from North River as soon as we have them, the contrast between the two should be interesting.

-          Jim Tierney at DEC gave me the following info on the plant condition – 1 pump/engine destroyed, one badly damaged, two possibly operational – they've brought in portable generators to the site, because ConEd is very hesitant to reconnect the plant to the grid until they know the condition of electrical systems, and possibly more about the cause of the fire.  They believe if they can get one pump running, they can begin primary treatment and disinfection on a broader scale.  Tierney also mentioned beach closures, and made a point of saying they wouldn't reopen beaches until sampling showed clean water. 

o   DEP and DEC have also convened a "bypass group" that is running a hydroqual model of bypass impacts – however, the model only assesses the impacts on designated swimming beaches, hence the early language about a 48 hour window before beaches would be closed. 

-          Coast Guard issued a radio advisory this afternoon on Channel 16, informing boaters about DEP's advisory.  Otherwise they are diverting all info requests back to DEP.

I think those are the key points – I spoke to lots of media today, core message was 'we need better public notification – more timely, more detailed, more interagency coordination, and specific advisories on the health risks and geographic scope of the advisory.'  I think the press release suggests DEP  is slowly moving in the  right direction, but it took them almost 24 hrs!  John Lipscomb, our boat captain, sent me a photo of guys swimming near Dyckman, south of the main CSO bypass outfall this afternoon.

Thanks,

Phillip

Phillip Musegaas, Esq.

Hudson River Program Director

Riverkeeper, Inc.

GPS coordinates for the CSO outfalls being used for the discharge are below, thanks. This is based on info from DEC Region 2 today.  I have a feeling they will add more outfalls, since we alerted them to 006 this afternoon.
            Latitude          Longitude         Location
 NR-023      40,44,42          74,00,36          W. 18th Street (6 blocks north of NR050)
NR 003      40,50,07          73,56,56          W. 158th St.  (just north of Riverkbank State Park and Trinity Cemetery)
NR 050      40,44,30          74,00,36          Bloomfield Street (Meatpacking District- 6 blocks south of NR023)
NR 045      40,51,35          73,54,56          Academy Street (Discharging into the HARLEM River)
NR 026      40,45,11          74,00,32          W. 26th Street (8 blocks north of NR 023)

NR 016      40,51,43          73,54,49          Harlem River, W. 203^rd st.
NR 006      40, 52,10         73,55,46          Dyckman St.