Sewage state of emergency in Paradise nearing the end, says mayor

For the last two weeks parts of Paradise, N.L. have been in a state of emergency as crews work to resolve a problem at a problematic sewage station.

But, Mayor Dan Bobbett says the end is in sight, now that a key piece of equipment has been delivered.

Lift Station 10, a sewage station that moves sewage from a lower elevation to a higher one, started having issues on Nov. 1 and pump trucks were called in to keep it online as residents in the areas of Plateau Park to Valley Ridge were asked to minimize water consumption.

Bobbett said a new pump finally arrived on Saturday, after weather delayed it being shipped to the province.

"It arrived at the site, it's being prepared to be installed right now," Bobbett told CBC Radio's The St. John's Morning Show on Monday.

"Crews have been busy mobilizing the bypass so that we can bypass the lift station completely — similar to what we did back in 2019 when there was an issue."

Five years ago, a failure in the system resulted in raw sewage flooding the lawn and driveway of a nearby resident. At one point it was costing the town $50,000 a day to manage the issue and was estimated to have cost approximately $1.5 million to fix.

Bobbett said once the pump replacement is installed, they can move on to the next phase of repairing Lift Station 10.

"Crews will be able to repair the existing lift station once it's drained completely and get in there and figure out exactly what needs to be done and get it done and get out of the state of emergency," he said.

Bobbett does not have an exact date for when the state of emergency could be lifted.

"I'm not going to put a time limit on it, but, you know, we're hoping the next couple of days or so," he said.

The area around the sewage station is a construction zone at the moment and residents are having to deal with trucks frequently moving back and forth.

Once the bypass is in place, said Bobbett, it'll reduce the need of the trucks the town has running on the road. 

"We'll still keep a few of those pumper trucks on standby until the testing is done and is up in full operation," said Bobbett.

Unknown cost

Paradise has had to rent pump trucks and buy additional pumps to help fix mitigate the problem at the lift station.

Bobbett said town staff are currently calculating how much the emergency is costing the community. But, he said, he's more concerned with getting the repair work done.

"We'll probably have the cost for that, you know, at a later date," said Bobbett.

In a previous interview with CBC News, Bobbett said a new $24 million facility that will replace the existing sewage station is expected to open in the coming months.

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