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BILL VARIANWith power out at some lift stations, county and Tampa officials are asking residents to exercise some restraint.
TAMPA - There are sayings for an occasion like this, but this is a family newspaper. So let's just say that Tampa and Hillsborough County officials are continuing to ask that residents keep the flushing of toilets to a minimum.
The same goes for doing laundry, running the dishwasher, taking showers or anything else that produces large volumes of sewage.
Power outages caused by Frances have knocked out several of the pump stations that help propel sewage through underground pipes. Flush too much, and the sewage could end up flowing the wrong way, into homes or businesses.
The request for restraint is likely to remain in place into the weekend.
So how much should you conserve? Government officials can't really say. They just ask that residents use as little water as they can for the time being.
"Nobody's saying, "Bust a gut,' " said Ralph Metcalf, director of the wastewater department of the city of Tampa. "We're just saying, "Curtail unnecessary usage.'
"If your plumbing flushes really slow, that's a sign that you better ease off."
And as with power outages, there is really no geographic part of the city or county where the problem is concentrated. It's all over.
So far, Metcalf said the city has received about 10 reports of sewage backups. The county, where the problem is less pronounced, had had only one report as of early Tuesday.
Sewage lines rely on gravity to take the waste away. In other words, pipes from homes and neighborhoods are tilted down underground. But there's a limit to how deep pipes can be laid to keep the sewage flowing. And terrain gets in the way.
That's where government uses lift or pump stations, to essentially hoist the sewage up, often to larger pipes, where gravity can take over again.
The lift stations are powered by electricity. And power is out to dozens of them.
"When a pump station stops, you kind of come to a dead-end," said Paul Vanderploog, the county's interim Water Department director.
So the sewer lines, many of them only 8 inches in diameter, hold the sewage. Once they fill up, that's when backups can occur. People in low-lying spots are at greatest risk. Gravity at work again.
Tampa Electric crews are working with the city and county to identify the nonfunctioning lift stations. Metcalf said as many as 102 of 220 city lift stations have been without power as of early Tuesday. About 35 have been restored.
The county has had as many as 53 of its nearly 700 pumping stations out of commission at some point. The number was down to 32 early Tuesday.
Both governments are using portable generators to get some of them going again. The county has also managed to temporarily bypass some of the stations.
Even when power is restored to all of the stations, it will likely take a couple of days to flush the entire network of pipes.
The sewer pipes are different from those that carry stormwater. But during heavy rains, water seeps into the sewer system in large volumes through cracks and even manhole covers.
"The system is so full now," Metcalf said. "I'd hate to think we get more rain."