State officials warned people Thursday to avoid contact with water or fish from several waterways in northern New Jersey, after billions of gallons of raw sewage were released from treatment plants that flooded and lost power during Hurricane Sandy.
"We would advise that people not fish, or eat fish, from the area" surrounding each plant, said Larry Hajna, a spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection.
The advisory is in effect for the Hudson, Raritan, Passaic and Hackensack rivers, Newark and Raritan bays, and the Kill van Kull and Arthur Kill.
The Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission plant alone has been releasing an estimated 400 million-500 million gallons of untreated wastewater a day into Newark Bay since it lost power at 9:20 p.m. on Monday, Hajna said. The Middlesex County Utilities Authority treatment plant on the Raritan River in Sayreville has been releasing 300 million gallons a day since it shut down, Hajna said.
Other shuttered plants include the North Hudson Sewerage Authority near the Hudson River in Hoboken and the Bayshore Regional Sewerage Authority in Union Beach, on Raritan Bay.
Untreated wastewater contains high levels of harmful bacteria, including the e-coli virus, which can cause diarrhea, kidney failure, and even death.
Fortunately, added Hajna, "there’s not a lot of active recreational uses this time of year."
Even moderate flooding can cause the release of untreated sewage by overwhelming the normal capacity of sewage treatment plants.
A loss of power means plants cannot pump wastewater through the normal primary and secondary treatment processes, according to state and environmental officials.
Treatment plants are equipped with back-up generators in the event of power outages. But shutdowns also occur, along with permanent damage, when a plant’s electric pumps and other equipment are inundated by extreme flooding while in operation. For that reason, plants often shut down in advance of a flood to minimize damage and the chance of electrical fires or explosions.
At the sprawling Passaic Valley plant at the eastern end of Wilson Avenue in Newark, a grayish-brown stain and small bits of debris stuck to a perimeter fence several feet above the ground. Nearby, an 8-inch fountain of raw sewage bubbled up from below the street in the middle of a putrid-smelling gray puddle.
Hajna said he did not know whether the Passaic Valley or other plants had powered down in advance of Monday night’s flooding.
He also could not say how long it would take for Passaic Valley or the other plants to resume treatment operations.
"They’ve got water in their tunnels," Hanja said Thursday. "And they need to pump out the water, and when they pump out the water, they need to take a look at the damages and make an assessment."
Passaic Valley officials declined to comment, referring questions to the DEP.
Jeff Tittel, director of the state Sierra Club chapter, said sewage treatment plants are particularly vulnerable to severe storms, just as residents are vulnerable to the effects of untreated sewage.
"The biggest problem is, when those floodwaters end up in Jersey City, Hoboken or along the Raritan Bay shores, there’s all kinds of pathogens in the water, like e-coli or salmonella, even meningitis," Tittel said. "And people could get sick from primary contact."