Estimated 30,000 litres of raw sewage dumped into Red River on Sunday, City of Winnipeg reports

Tens of thousands of litres of raw sewage spilled into the Red River on Sunday in Winnipeg's Glenelm neighbourhood. 

An overflow alarm at the Hart Avenue lift station alerted the city's Wastewater Control Centre shortly after 3 a.m., a city release said. 

A crew arrived at the site to investigate the alert around 3:40 a.m. and found two fire hydrants had been opened and the water was draining into the combined sewer outfall at 1 Hart Ave., near the Harry Lazarenko Bridge, the city said.

The overflow caused an estimated 30,000 litres of raw sewage to spill into the river over a period of approximately 21 minutes, the news release said.

The crew shut off the fire hydrants, the use of which had not been authorized. Around 5:25 a.m., the remaining wastewater was pumped out and the station resumed normal operations, the release said. 

The city's water and waste department was not available for an interview with CBC on Tuesday, but an email statement said the unauthorized use of fire hydrants is rare and a violation of the city's water bylaw.

"We do not know the identity of the person(s) that opened the hydrants, or why they did it, and are therefore … unable to pursue a penalty under the City's Water By-law," the statement said.

The fire hydrants were not damaged, the department spokesperson said.

Before this spill, an estimated 422,860 litres of raw sewage had been dumped into the Red River on five separate occasions in different locations in Winnipeg since Jan. 2, city reports say.

Mayor Scott Gillingham said the city is making big investments in its wastewater system to prevent diluted or raw sewage from going into rivers, reporters were told at a news conference on Feb. 3.

The Manitoba government charged the city after a pipe carrying raw sewage under the Red River near the Fort Garry Bridge ruptured on Feb. 7 last year, causing a leak of 230 million litres. 

The city is also facing lawsuits from a group of First Nations over the spill, which they say will have devastating downstream impacts on their communities.

In total, lawsuits are seeking an estimated $6 billion in damages.