Foul Water in Rawreth Lane

July

18

10 comments

We’ve been contacted by some residents in Laburnum Way, Rawreth, who have a serious problem with a polluted ditch near their homes.

It’s a surface water ditch that passes the edge of the Wimpey houses being built at the Park School site, and then runs alongside Rawreth Lane for a while.

For the past fortnight there’s been a sewage smell coming out of the ditch. This week some residents contacted Anglian water, who arrived very quickly – within a half an hour. We understand that they carried out an ammonia test which confirmed there is human effluent in there. One explanation could be that someone has recently contacted a sewage pipe into the surface water system by mistake.

The smell is unpleasant, and is clearly a health hazard. We’ll be asking Anglian Water for a copy of their written report on this, and doing what we can to get the culprit to sort this out immediately.

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  • We are very grateful to Chris for coming down to see the problem and in helping us begin to get this health hazard sorted out.

    As we have a young family and live to close to the ditch, we are very concerned about this.

    Should there not be checks and processes to ensure this does not happen?
    Is it not something that the Environmental Agency/Public Health/Health and Safety Executive should be urgently looking in to?
    This is, after all, more than a ‘risk’ or ‘near miss’, but a real incident.
    The Public (residents, school children, Makro workers and others) are being exposed to human effluent.

    Talking to our Neighbour colleagues it doesn’t appear that the Council were very helpful when contacted. It is not always clear to residents who we should be calling and you would think the Council may be able to point us in the right direction!

  • What also needs to be looked at is how many miles of ditch within Tryndehayes have been contaminated with this hazard waste.

    As the contaminated ditch at Laburmum Way all go in to the ditch in Trenders Ave and Chestnut Dr.

    There are also fishing lakes off Goldsmith Dr and McCalmont Dr that mit be affected by this as the ditch go by the fishing lakes there.

    As well as the impact on the on the local environment in Tryndehayes.

  • Does anyone know the current status of this?
    The non too pleasant smell seems to have returned and the ditch near to Laburnum Way seems to be regularly inspected by construction manager types over the past week.
    I presume something is going on?

  • Hi Mark, I’m trying to get an update but no real news tonight.

    I had a look at the ditch tonight but could hardly detect anything (though my sense of smell isn’t that good). There was a much stronger agricultural smell further west along Rawreth Lane tonight!!

  • I understand unofficially that last week Anglian Water tested the ditch by the Laburnum Way junction and found reportable levels of ammonia there.

    I also understand that the culvert under the junction is moving and needs some attention……

  • can we get them to test the ditch in the Tryndehayes area. as any water (hazard waste) that came from the ditch in Laburnum way goes in the the Tryndehayes ditch network.

    Also what are the Environment Agency doing about this environment deserter in this area

  • The smell has been awful. It seems to smell awful every couple of days. The worst day was 9th August when it almost made me physically sick.

    I am also getting the same smell from my sink (although not as strong) every time I run my washing machine. This has only happened in the last 3-4 weeks. I have also spoken to my neighbour across the road and she has had the same problem, so I’m sure it must be connected?

    It’s getting so we can’t open our windows, so this matter needs urgent attention please!

    I live in Laburnum Way.

  • There’s another strange smell coming from the ditch today. Particularly at the end nearest to Asda. It’s difficult to describe what the odour is like, but certainly not the same as the sewerage type smells previously.
    The water is also cloudy. Would be useful to hear if anyone agrees with me or knows what might have happened.

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