PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Call it the big flush. Because a 21-year-old man was caught on a security camera urinating into a city reservoir, Oregon’s biggest city is sending 8 million gallons of treated drinking water down the drain. Portland officials defended the decision Monday, saying they didn’t want to send city residents water laced, however infinitesimally, with urine. Public health officials say, however, that urine is sterile in healthy people and that the urine in the reservoir was so diluted – perhaps a half pint in millions of gallons – that it posed little risk.
The young man, Josh Seater, told KATU-TV he’d been drinking, was with friends and thought that the reservoir was a sewage treatment plant. He said he felt guilty instantly, and then security guards arrived. “I knew I did wrong when I did it,” he told the station. In addition to the sewage charge, Shaff said, the flushed water is worth $28,000.
Some people in the city, in the suburbs and around the world called the flush an overreaction, especially since animals such as ducks contribute waste routinely and, sometimes, die in the water. “More than 1 billion people worldwide do not have reliable access to clean drinking water, and here we are tossing away nearly 8 million gallons of water just to appease the ignorant residents who believe their tap water will otherwise turn yellow,” read one comment posted on The Oregonian’s Website.
The public pool system will however, remain open for businesss! Last one in is a rotten egg…….
From the article: “The reservoirs are drained twice a year for cleaning, and workers have found animal carcasses, paint cans, construction material, fireworks debris and even the plastic bags people use to scoop up after their dogs.”
vs 6 oz of urine?
It’s just the circle of life.
One of my old lecturers at University used to have a saying when questioned on the correct spelling of items.
“The ‘P’ is silent – as in Swim”.
… and in the next spelling bee, “reservoir” will now contain a small p.
Hard to say who is stupider, the drunk tard who did the peeing or the officials who wasted 8 million gallons of water that was most likely already peed in before he came along.
They must have found a way to keep ducks away from their reservoir. You don’t want to think what THEY are doing to the water! /s
The Portlanders I talked to are glad they drained the water.
The local news was running footage of this idiot pee’ing in the reservoir and the ick factor is too high.
And, make no mistake, this guy is an idiot. I know that reservoir and it is clearly marked. I looks NOTHING like a sewer treatment plant.
I sure hope they bill him the $33k.
As for wasting water — it’s not much of a factor this year. I doubt we’ll have any shortages.
Just bottle it and sell it $1 a pint.
what about chlorine in water
does it have no effectiveness ?
Seems strange to me
The water will be mixed with sewage on the way out a treatment plant
Come back as rain and its one big cycle
Go figure
a lake is nothing but a bird bathroom
moron, not moran
There is a silent familiarity with internet culture in moran.
If you do something stupid, I can see getting fined and ticketed or whatever but not having to pay for the independent stupidity of “officials” who should know better?
Good opportunity to teach the public what challenges the public water system faces/cleans all the time. Pandering to the anti-science crowd will only lead to religion.
Dilution is the solution to pollution.
how much gets dumped when a bird flies over and craps in it?
#11 — http://urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=moran
>Shaff said, the flushed water is worth $28,000.
THAT RIGHT THERE my friends, is why the city flushed it.
This had Nothing to do with safety, despite what those other silly health officials were rambling on about.
Ka-ching$$
Case Study in how City Official will love to Rack Up The Charges onto some fool.
Now you know: City man is from the Government, and he’s Here to Help… line his coffers with someone else’s money.
How many bears, dogs, deer peed in this lake, and yet you drank it like a boss?
A model citizen.
Purely a political decision, rather than any science based, public health, decision. Damn the cost, the voters aren’t gonna drink even one part in 10 million, worth of pee. But the 10 parts in a million of duck pee and dog poop, they didn’t know about? That’s ok. Basically your typical “throw the baby out with the bath water” over-reaction. They should have sent the “pee” contaminated water out to farmer for irrigation use. But I guess that Pacific Ocean is just too temping a target, not to dump stuff into. Even if it perfectly acceptable drinking water, anywhere else in the world.
We had three good laughs at work about this today.
#1 They flushed the basin due to the tiny amount of urine. Not due the the fact they maintain an open reservoir for finished water storage.
#2 They are just now constructing a closed system? I guess they have never heard of this new thing call a water tower.
#3 They actually think that 28K is the actually value of the finished water after treatment gross (no pun) underestimate.
#7 Greg it depends I had many people mistake the wastewater plant as the drinking water plant. A reservoir and a lagoon look pretty similar. The process are similar as well screening, coagulation, floculation, filtration, disinfection, discharge.
#9 Chlorination even with chloromines has a limited life in the water. The more organics in the water the less time chlorine will reside. Its most likely they chlorinate before storage and after it leaves the basin as well using a booster station. Of course there are those facilities across the country that do not chlorinate at all. If the facility can show that they can obtain samples showing no fecal or e-coli contamination many states and federal regulators can opt the system out of mandatory disinfection.
who the hell has open reservoirs in this day? portland sounds backwards…
Within limits, I’m thinking the pee, poo, and decomposing bodies is not any real concern. Wouldn’t it be the chemical contaminants that are new in the environment? something washed off the land and into the water? something leached out of the delivery system? We are after all surrounded by pee and poo all the time.
It is believed by some people that every molecule of water on our planet has passed through at least seven human kidneys.
Now that’s what I call recycling.
#25 It is believed by some people that there are alien beings who somehow kidnap you from your home, unseen by anyone in the neighborhood, stick objects into you while you are in their flying saucer, and then return you to your home.
things to know about this location..
1. it in the Downtown area, west side…
2. its a VERY large park..(one of the largest in the USA)
3. 8 million gallons would only last 2-3 days.
4. this reserve is only for Down town.
5. its an OPEN pond system, there is more then 1 pond..this should be ALL of them, not 1.
6. talking about an area that is considered a rain forest.
Insane. Every hour of every day, fish, ducks, salamanders, bugs and mammals pee and defecate into the reservoir. If this guy was the fullest possible, he had one pound of pee in him. Max.
Versus the 65,000,000 pounds of “fresh” water they dumped.
You know, for health reasons.
Yeah. That’s the ticket…
The good news is that the water is 285 gallons for a dollar.
I think there should be a new drink in Portland. It’s a tall, refreshing, ice cold, crisp glass of water with 1/65,000,000th part human urine in it. Good for adults and kids, too, since it’s non-alcoholic.
Mmm. Mm. The Capital P.
‘Moran’ is a name, probably of Irish origin.
‘Moron’ on the other hand, is alleged to be a variety of Salamander (Oxford English Dictionary).
“1774 (1823) III. 158 Goldsmith Nat. Hist. With respect to the Salamander,the whole tribe, from the Moron to the Gekko, are said to be venomous to the last degree.”
Why do you insult Salamanders? As well as our Queen’s English language?
Another moron in the “moran” style:
Congressman Jim Moran
http://moran.house.gov/