Thirty-eight million gallons of treated, ready-to-drink water will be flushed into the Columbia River after a teenager peed in a city reservoir. The city admits that there's no public health risk from a few drops of pee, but it's more of a service issue, says Water Bureau Administrator David Shaff: "The reality is our customers don't anticipate drinking water that's been contaminated by some yahoo who decided to pee into a reservoir."
The incident happened early Wednesday morning. At least one teenager was seen on a surveillance camera as he peed through the wrought-iron fence that surrounds the Mt. Tabor Reservoir, which is located in a park east of downtown. Two other teenagers were caught trying to scale the fence. They were all cited for trespassing, and the pee-er cited for public urination.
Amazingly, this happened at the same reservoir in 2011, too. And not only that, it was the same guy. 21-year-old Josh Seater, then 18, cause the city to drain eight million gallons of water back then. "I had a pleasant buzz and I should have known better," Seater told the police officer who caught him on a surveillance camera.
A little dribble of a few ounces of pee is just a few drops in the bucket, and birds do all sorts of unspeakably things to the already-treated drinking water in open reservoirs. But this kind of thing makes you wonder why more cities haven't taken their open-air treated reservoirs offline. This time, and last time, it was just a little pee, and bird poop, but next time it could be a terrorist dumping a cup full of Ebola into the reservoir.
(AP) Portland plans reservoir flush after teen cited
The incident happened early Wednesday morning. At least one teenager was seen on a surveillance camera as he peed through the wrought-iron fence that surrounds the Mt. Tabor Reservoir, which is located in a park east of downtown. Two other teenagers were caught trying to scale the fence. They were all cited for trespassing, and the pee-er cited for public urination.
Amazingly, this happened at the same reservoir in 2011, too. And not only that, it was the same guy. 21-year-old Josh Seater, then 18, cause the city to drain eight million gallons of water back then. "I had a pleasant buzz and I should have known better," Seater told the police officer who caught him on a surveillance camera.
A little dribble of a few ounces of pee is just a few drops in the bucket, and birds do all sorts of unspeakably things to the already-treated drinking water in open reservoirs. But this kind of thing makes you wonder why more cities haven't taken their open-air treated reservoirs offline. This time, and last time, it was just a little pee, and bird poop, but next time it could be a terrorist dumping a cup full of Ebola into the reservoir.
(AP) Portland plans reservoir flush after teen cited
