Outage Causes Sewage Spill in Ventura Harbor

A power failure at a municipal waste-water treatment plant Monday unleashed 250,000 gallons of raw sewage into the city’s marina, forcing the closure of Ventura Harbor for the second time in a week.

A contractor working near the treatment plant hit and damaged the main power line to the facility about 11:30 a.m., disabling the pump systems and forcing untreated waste water to gush out of manholes along Navigator Drive.

The sewage spill went unchecked for 35 to 40 minutes, pouring into the harbor and oozing into neighboring businesses, as city crews worked to restore power. Emergency power was fired up about 1:30 p.m., bringing the pumps back on line, and full power was restored an hour later.

“Sewage does not stop coming to the plant just because we stop pumping here. It’s on gravity; it just wants to come,” said Greg Morehead, utilities manager for the city. “It makes us in our field feel terrible. We were doing everything we could and still weren’t able to stop it.”

Last week, the harbor waters were posted off limits after approximately 900 gallons of untreated sewage polluted the marina. That spill was caused by a clogged sewer line, but health officials declared the water safe for swimmers within a couple of days.

City officials said there was no way to know how long it would be before health officials do the same thing for the harbor after Monday’s spill, which occurred at the treatment plant adjacent to the intersection of Harbor Boulevard and Spinnaker Drive.

Warning signs were posted along beaches three miles above and below the harbor entrance and at entrance points throughout the marina, including the Ventura Keys.

The signs will remain until it has been determined that water quality is within acceptable bacteriological limits, Morehead said.

“There’s not much you can do about it,” he said. “It’s just got to work its way out of the harbor.”

Morehead said the spill could have been much worse. When the power was cut, and backup power didn’t immediately kick on as it should have, he said city crews scrambled to open up other systems to store the overflow--a move that reduced the discharge by about 100,000 gallons.

After power was restored, Morehead said crews used a large vacuum to suck up about 7,200 gallons that had collected in the streets and nearby parking lots.

Morehead said city workers are investigating why the backup power system didn’t turn on. And city staff also will be evaluating whether the contractor, who was digging a water retention pit near the treatment plant, was negligent. No one was hurt during the incident. Monday’s spill was the latest in a series of sewage-related problems in local waterways during the last 12 months.

Every beach in Ventura County was closed for a week last February after a broken pipe in Thousand Oaks spilled about 86 million gallons of untreated effluent and heavy rains last winter washed contaminants down local rivers into the sea.

In May, 22,500 gallons of raw sewage flowed down the Ventura River and into the ocean after a pump owned by the Ojai Valley Sanitation District overflowed near Meiners Oaks. A 2-mile swath of beach was closed for two days.