The most popular and densely populated shellfishing area in Rhode Island is temporarily closed after 800,000 gallons of untreated sewage spilled into Narragansett Bay from a sewage pipe in East Providence Monday.
The cause of the ruptured 20-inch pipe near Watchemoket Cove along the East Bay Bike Path remains under investigation by the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management and the city of East Providence, which owns the wastewater treatment plant, Joe Haberek, DEM’s surface water protection and water quality control administrator, said in an interview Wednesday. The leak from a cracked pipe elbow was first reported by the East Providence Wastewater Treatment Facility shortly before noon Monday, Haberek said.
The pipe funnels raw sewage into the Riverside wastewater facility. By the time the leak was detected, there was no place for the sewage to go but into the Providence River, which feeds into Narragansett Bay, Haberek said.
“You can’t just immediately shut down the pump station,” he explained. “It would have been backing up into people’s homes.”
Wastewater plant operators set up portable pumps to bypass the broken main pipe, allowing sewage treatment operations to continue uninterrupted by 8 a.m. Tuesday, East Providence Mayor Bob DaSilva said in a Facebook post Tuesday afternoon.
“No additional leak beyond the 800,000 gallons currently exists, and we will continue to work with all stakeholders to effectively complete this repair,” DaSilva wrote.
However, Chris Dodge, Narragansett Baykeeper for Save The Bay, said the remaining discharge in the pipe was still slowly emptying into the river as of Wednesday morning.
Save the Bay called out the sewage spill — the second in two weeks, following a smaller discharge of 5,000 gallons from the Mt. Hope Pump Station in Bristol into Mount Hope Bay on April 24 — as evidence of the need to modernize and strengthen the state’s wastewater treatment infrastructure. A section of Mount Hope Bay known as Growing Area 17 between Bristol and Portsmouth remains closed to shellfishing due to the previous sewage spill.
“Rhode Islanders have worked hard and invested billions of dollars, over decades, to improve water quality in Narragansett Bay,” Dodge said in a statement. “However, the progress we’ve made is under threat. Incidents like these show how quickly that progress can be undermined when preventable pollution enters our waters.”
Matthew Paddock, a spokesperson for the city, said the wastewater plant contractor, Veolia, is working on a long-term solution to prevent another leak in the pipe.
“Mayor DaSilva is deeply disappointed by this incident,” Paddock said in an emailed response Wednesday. “While unforeseen, it has serious consequences for our natural resources and the shell fishing industry. We are committed to taking every necessary step to ensure this never happens again.”
A timeline for repairs was not immediately available.
The city-owned plant on Crest Avenue in Riverside treats 2.5 millions of gallons of wastewater per day, serving 46,000 customers in East Providence and Barrington.
But quahoggers will have to wait until at least May 18 to return to the 1,900-acre area between Bullocks Point in East Providence and Gaspee Point in Warwick.
The area known by DEM as 16E was conditionally reopened to shellfishing in 2021 after 75 years of closure, the Providence Journal reported. Decades of cleanup efforts alongside a multiphase multibillion-dollar sewage overflow containment system by Narragansett Bay Commission allowed shellfishing to return to the species-rich riverbeds after state tests confirmed water quality improvements. Roughly 100 to 150 shellfishermen populate the abundant riverbeds during designated quahogging hours on Mondays and Wednesday, Haberek said.
“This is where they get the majority of their harvest,” he said. “It’s definitely the most heavily shellfished area in the state.”
Federal shellfishing laws mandate at least a seven-day closure following the sewage spill, after which new samples of water quality and shellfish tissue will be collected. Assuming results meet acceptable levels for fecal matter and bacteria, the area could reopen by May 15, although quahoggers won’t be able to return until designated hours the following Monday, Haberek said.
The state health department also issued a public advisory Wednesday to avoid direct contact with water in the Cove for the next seven days. There are no swimmable beaches in the area.
Potential enforcement against the city and wastewater plant for the leak has not been determined, Haberek said.
Haberek did not know when the section of main pipe that cracked was built or last repaired.
This story was originally published by the Rhode Island Current.
