DeKalb news: At least 15 new sewer spills reported

DeKalb County reported at least 15 sewer spills late Thursday or early Friday, as the soggy start to 2020 continues to wreak havoc on the county’s aging infrastructure.

The new spills included one at the same location as last month’s incident that sent an estimated 9.2 million gallons of sewage into Snapfinger Creek.

Few details were immediately available about the more recent spills, which can send harmful pathogens like E.coli into local waterways. An estimated volume was only provided for one incident: a 5,220-gallon spill near 2nd Avenue in Decatur.

DeKalb County has been under a federal consent decree to repair its aging water and sewer infrastructure since 2011. The county will miss the original deadline set for June of this year, but an extension is being negotiated.

Little progress was made in DeKalb’s first several years under the consent decree. DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond has touted the sewer system as a top priority since taking office in 2017, and sewer spill volumes had decreased in DeKalb in 2018 and 2019.

But historic amounts of rain have helped fuel a sloppy 2020.

Weather can fuel sewer spills through a phenomenon called stormwater intrusion, where rain infiltrates the sewer system through things like manholes and cracked pipes, overwhelming the system and forcing out sewage already in the pipes.