Malfunction at lift station causes sanitary sewer overflow in Paddock Lake

The above image from Google Maps  shows the lift station at McAlonan Park

A malfunction at a lift station — thought to be caused by a lightning strike or other electrical spike during a storm — caused an overflow of sanitary sewer water into the Paddock Lake channel this morning, village administrator Tim Popanda said.

All beaches on Paddock Lake have been closed to swimming pending testing for elevated E.coli, Popanda said. Testing at the beaches and where the channel meets the main lake body is scheduled to be conducted by the county Division of Health Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week.

The malfunction occurred at the lift station at McAlonan Park, along 248th Avenue between 72nd and 73rd streets.

“It was a perfect storm, no pun intended,” Popanda said.

Village officials received an alert from the lift station regarding a bad battery. Staff checking out the situation determined the battery was OK, but then a citizen reported overflow coming from a manhole on 72nd Street adjacent to the channel and the real problem was known.

The electrical spike is thought to have caused a loss of power to the lift station’s control panel resulting in a disruption of pumping and the overflow, Popanda said.

A lift station pumps wastewater from a lower elevation to a high elevation.

The overflow went undetected for about 45 minutes, Popanda estimated. The overflow was detected at 10:45 a.m. and corrected by 11:10 a.m.

Popanda said the volume of water in the channel could mean elevated E.coli will not be detected there or at the beaches on the lake since the wastewater will be diluted.

PATS Services was brought in to remove visible wastewater in the area of the discharge, Popanda said.

The discharge has been reported to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, which has agreed to attribute it to an act of God, Popanda said.

Other than a discharge at the wastewater treatment plant last summer caused by the flood-producing rains of July, the village has not had a discharge like Tuesday’s incident in about five years, Popanda said.