Almost 600,000 gallons of raw sewage was dumped into the Indian River Lagoon earlier this week after a sewage main break left Brevard County scrambling to clean it up.

20-year-old sewer pipe burst Tuesday morning

More than a million gallons of raw sewage leaked



Brevard said it was forced to dump sewage into Indian River Lagoon



After a mile-long stretch of 20-year-old sewer pipe burst and caused a spill Tuesday morning, about 1.44 million gallons of sewage leaked into the ground.

Although sewage didn’t seep into homes or businesses, the county said it was forced to dump almost 600,000 gallons of raw sewage into the lagoon.

“At one point, the retention ponds filled up, and we ran out of tanker trucks," Brevard County spokesman Don Walker said. "At some point, you have to put that waste somewhere."

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The county was able to recover 651,000 gallons and take it to a treatment facility. Another 210,000 gallons was placed in retention ponds, but that still left another 578,000 gallons the county had to get rid of.

"Once those ponds fill, there's only one other place to put that, other than have it go into homes and businesses: into the canal that leads in the Indian River Lagoon," Walker said.

In addition to the concern over the spread of disease, raw sewage of that magnitude can affect the lagoon, already plagued and choked by algae blooms and fish kills.

It's one reason the county is making repairing the 20-year-old sewer pipe a top priority.

“We’re going to try to replace that as soon as possible," Walker said. "We’ve been in the design phase of that project, and because of this most recent incident, I think we are definitely going to be fast-tracking it.”

The county had asked residents in the affected area avoid using water, but that water restriction has been lifted. It said there were no long-term problems for homes or businesses.



Brevard recently approved a referendum on a half-cent sales tax increase to help restore the Indian River Lagoon over a 10-year period.