The most productivequahoggingarea in Rhode Island will be shut down for nearly two weeks at least after a sewer main pipe ruptured in East Providence, spewing hundreds of thousands of gallons of untreated sewage into Narragansett Bay.
The state Department of Environmental Management announced the closure of the Lower Providence River to all shellfishing on May 5 after about 800,000 gallons of sewage had emptied into the river nearWatchemoket Covefrom the spill that was still ongoing in the afternoon.
“It’s a very significant spill,” said Joseph Haberek, administrator of surface water protection and water quality at the DEM.
Significant not just in the amount of sewage that had been discharged but also because of its concentration. Wastewater spills more typically involve a mix of sewage and stormwater and occur when systems overflow during heavy rains.
When they do involve undiluted sewage, they are generally smaller. The most recent comparable incidenthappened in Warwick in 2022when a ruptured sewer line discharged 450,000 gallons of wastewater into Warwick Pond, which connects to the Bay.
Source of the sewage spill is a ruptured pipe on the East Bay Bike Path
The source of the current spill is a 20-inch forced main pipe that broke open May 4 along a stretch of the East Bay Bike Path that runs between the Providence River and Watchemoket Cove. The pipe channels raw sewage to the East Providence Wastewater Treatment Facility on Crest Avenue in Riverside.
Workers from the plant had reduced the discharge from the pipe, but had been unable to eliminate it by the time the DEM announced the rupture. Crews were on site to continue the repair of the leaking line. Access to the bike path and Watchemoket Cove may be impacted during the work.
The treatment facility was able to bypass a pump station and shut down the flow of sewage into the pipe, but workers haven’t been able to manually empty it. Because the area where the break occurred is far from any roads, they can’t get a septage truck in to siphon out the sewage.
Instead, they’ve had no choice but to let the estimated 65,000 gallons of sewage that still remained in the pipe slowly drain into the river, Haberek said.
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The cause of the break is unknown at this time. The DEM’s Office of Compliance and Inspection is investigating. When asked if the treatment facility could be fined, Haberek said that the incident is under review for enforcement.
Shellfishing closure affects prime quahog beds
The DEM is suspending all shellfishing in the Lower Providence Area because of the risk of contamination from the spill. The closure affects what’s known as Area E, a stretch of waters north of a line from Conimicut Point in Warwick to Nayatt Point in Barrington and south of a line from Gaspee Point in Warwick to Bullock Point in East Providence.
The area,which reopened to shellfishing in 2021 after being closed for 75 years, has the highest quahog numbers in the Bay and harvests there are tightly controlled to prevent depletion. Shellfishermen were set to follow a schedule allowing them access for two hours each Monday and Wednesday morning for most of May.
The spill began after they wrapped up their morning on May 4. The DEM waited to assess the impact before announcing the closure the next day.
Harvests in Area E have been good so far this year, aided in part by a dry April that meant beds weren’t forced to close for stormwater overflows, said Michael McGiveney, president of the Rhode Island Shellfisherman’s Association.
“Unfortunately, this sewage spill is closing it down for us now,” he said.
Under federal guidelines, the shellfishing beds have to remain closed for a minimum of seven days. The DEM will take water quality and quahog samples May 12. It will take two or three days for results from the Rhode Island Department of Health lab to come back, so the earliest the river could reopen to harvesting is Monday, May 18, said Haberek.
If the samples show contamination, the closure could last longer, he said.
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal:Hundreds of thousands of gallons of untreated sewage spills into Narragansett Bay
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