By Greg Fry

Downtown sewer main break triggers city’s spill response protocol

Feb 15, 2018 | 8:34 AM

KAMLOOPS — City crews are busy repairing a sewer force main break in the 900-block of Lorne Street in downtown Kamloops this (Thursday) morning.

Utility Services Manager with the City of Kamloops Greg Wightman says work started last night.

“We initially got a report about six o’clock that there was some water running down the asphalt at 950 Lorne Street, which is the Park Place strata complex,” he says. “Our crews were on site within 20 minutes to investigate and quickly realized it wasn’t water, it was in fact sewer and it was the sewer force main that comes out of one of our pump stations.”

Wightman says crews were able to shut it down within 20 minutes and then spent most of the night setting up bypass pumping and getting trucks organized to haul the sewage around the broken section of pipe so that residents in the south-east sector of town could continue to use their sewer services.

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As a result of the repairs, he says Lorne Street has been closed to traffic between Eighth Avenue and 10th Avenue .

“Due to the location, it is likely that some sewage has entered the South Thompson River through nearby catch basins. The city’s Spill Response Protocol has been enacted and the Ministry of Environment has been notified.”

In the meantime, the city has implemented a temporary solution to divert sewage away from the break area.

While crews are doing their work, Wightman asks that residents in Rose Hill, Valleyview, Juniper, Barnhatvale, Dallas, Campbell Creek, Sun Rivers and along East Shuswap Road limit indoor water usage until further notice to help reduce further backup and mitigate environmental impact.

“What we’re asking is if residents can avoid some of the things you can kind of control over the course of the day like limiting showers, laundry and dishwashing. Things that add a lot of liquid to our sewer system that would help our crews that are down there and will be cutting the pipe out and replacing the broken section.”

The city says crews will be working around the clock until the break is repaired.