A gigantic mass dubbed a “fatberg” was discovered in a sewer pipe serving Macomb County, Michigan.
The pipe collects waste from Clinton, Harrison, Chesterfield and Lenox townships along with the village of New Haven.
Apparently residents in those counties dumped enough non-biodegradable material down their drains that it served to bind together fat and grease, which congealed into a solid, malodorous mass.
“You'll find this in a restaurant situation when they’re not inspecting and cleaning out their grease traps on a regular basis. In residential situations, you’re making some hamburgers or whatever and you just pour the grease down the sewer. It shouldn’t go down the sewer.”
Food waste is a main ingredient of the “fatberg,” but not the cause of the gelatinous blockage.
“The biggest problem is the baby wipes,” Miller said. “Even though the package says they’re flushable, they’re not biodegradable. Go ahead and use them, just don’t flush them down the toilet.”
19 Stubborn Tons of Stinking Waste
The blockage built up at the Clintondale Pump Station in Clinton Township, about 15 miles northeast of Detroit, where the Lakeshore Interceptor ends and waste is pumped upwards from the 55-foot-deep Interceptor to the next pipe in the network, the 15 Mile Interceptor, which is about 20 feet higher. From there the waste is supposed to go to a processing plant in Detroit.The blob was about 100 feet long, six feet tall, and weighed about 19 tons when county officials decided it was time to remove it. If they had let it grow, the “fatberg” would have blocked the entire pipe and spewed sewage out into the environment.
The county called Doetsch Environmental Services to remove the gooey mass. At first the company tried suction, but the fatberg was too dense. Next, the removal crew tired to cut up the fatberg with high-pressure water—but it was too tough.
Ultimately, Doetsch workers had to crawl into the pipe with handsaws and hack the stinking mass into portable pieces, some of which were sucked out, and some of which had to be carried out.
Joe Schotthoefer of Doetsch Environmental said he had never seen a clog so large.
“There was so much sanitary trash intermingled with the grease that our normal methods were largely ineffective,” he told the Macomb Daily. “Everyone needs to be environmental stewards. This is all solid waste that should be on the curb, not down your drain.”
Public Works Commissioner Candice Miller wanted to make sure county residents knew that there was a cost to dumping the wrong stuff down the sink and toilet—in this case, $100,000.
“We want to use this as a teachable moment if we can to get folks to change their behavior towards what they’re putting down in the sewer,” Miller told a news conference on Sept. 13.
“There’s an enormous cost (to removing fatbergs) and we’re all paying for it. We don’t want to continue to do it.”
Far From the Worst Fatberg
While the Michigan fatberg was certainly as large and as foul as anyone would ever want, it is not as bad as fatbergs can get.It gets worse than that, though.
“It’s basically like trying to break up concrete. It’s frustrating as these situations are totally avoidable and caused by fat, oil and grease being washed down sinks and wipes flushed down the loo.”
