MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – Sunday, in about two and half hours 50,000 gallons of sewage leaked into the Withers Swash area after a valve broke on a pipe off of 5t Avenue South in Myrtle Beach.
Myrtle Beach City Officials were first notified of the leak by people who live around the area. Now the city is reaching out to external agencies to see how much sewage contaminated the waters around the area.
City spokesperson Mark Kruea says in this instance a valve from the pumping station broke, and instead of pumping air it pumped sewage into the waterway.
He says the city already decontaminated the area where the valve break happened, however there are concerns the sewage flowed into Withers Swash and then out into the ocean.
“We notified DHEC and asked Coastal Carolina University to take two water quality samples within the swash area and then one at ocean front just to make sure that if we lost some sewage that it didn’t get that far; or if it did get that far so that we would know,” said Kruea.
Back in June of 2014, another sewage leak happened on the same street.
Kruea says the two incidents are unrelated.
“Different problems occurred in those two instances. One was an actual sewer line failure this was a valve that failed,” he said.
There are health risks associated with coming into contact with the contaminated water. However, those can simply be avoided by not swimming in the water.
Kruea says he expects to get water quality ratings back from DHEC and CCU sometime tomorrow. From there, they will have a better understanding of how far this leak spread.