Baltimore Tradition Continues

More than 20,000 gallons of raw sewage released into Baltimore waterways over weekend

Sunday's rain flooded the city's sewer system late in the evening, and an engineered structure at Charles and Lanvale streets released more than 10,000 gallons of raw waste into the Jones Falls in Baltimore to prevent backups, public works spokesman Jeffrey Raymond said. Raymond called the sewage spill a "brief episode as a result of water infiltrating these old sewer lines."

The other major sewage dump, in the 1500 block of North Chapel Street in Broadway East, was leaking an estimated 10 gallons per minute Monday morning into storm drains that eventually run to the harbor, Raymond said. It had leaked more than 10,000 gallons of untreated sewage as of Monday, and while it was discovered late last week, Raymond said, the city has been unable to determine what caused it or how to fix it.

State and federal regulators in June agreed to give Baltimore another five years to repair and replace cracked and aging portions of its sewer system to prevent raw sewage from pouring into its waterways.

No hurry. . .  You can always blame the farmers for the dirty water.