A Southern Water team is ‘investigating’ as a stream of faeces and bathroom paper has overflowed from a drain by Margate Police Station and is operating down Fort Hill in the direction of Turner Contemporary in the present day (March 22).
The foul smelling waste is operating at quantity into the highway.
Southern Water has been alerted by The Isle of Thanet News, Thanet councillor Helen Whitehead and anxious members of the general public.
In a social media put up Cllr Whitehead mentioned: “I have contacted Southern Water regarding the river of sewage currently flowing down Fort Hill Road, along with a request for a detailed explanation of how exactly they will be cleaning up human biological waste that is currently being spread across Margate.
“Nothing about the current state of our sewage systems is acceptable, and an extensive biological clean up, as well as a full explanation of how this happened, and how it will be prevented in future, is essential.”
Fellow Margate councillor Rob Yates mentioned the team now on-site says the trigger is from wet wipes.
Cllr Yates mentioned: “They say it’s from wet wipes which are flushable, but get stuck in the sewer system causing a backlog.”
A spokesperson for Southern Water mentioned: “At 12:42pm on Sunday, we were alerted to an overflowing manhole in Fort Hill, Margate. Our team attended the site promptly and identified a blocked sewer as the cause of the overflow.
“We cleared the blockage and removed all solids that had spilled onto the road as a result. The area has now been cleaned, and the network is operating normally once again.
“This blockage was caused by wet wipes and cooking fat – a major issue for sewage companies and their customers. We have 34 000 advanced monitors across our network which use AI to detect blockages forming so we can step in before this kind of pollution happens.
“Last year we intervened early more than 4000 times thanks to this system. But 70 per cent of blockages are preventable if only pee poo and paper go down the loo and cooking fat is disposed of in the bin.”
