Earthplace Water Testing Detectives

Sometimes everybody's happy.

Take this recent example from a Stamford Advocate photo assignment.

A local oysterman, Norm Bloom, hates it when the Long Island Sound becomes polluted, because when bacteria levels are too high, his operation is shut down until the water is safe again. Shellfish filter the water, so if the water's toxic, the shellfish are no good. It's in Bloom's best interest for the source of the problem to be located quickly, so he can get back to work. It's also in the best interest of everyone who lives near the Sound to have good water quality so they can swim and fish in it, too.

Enter the good folks at Earthplace. They're watchdogs for water quality -- they test it regularly. Many of the testers are volunteers, including enterprising high school students who do some testing as part of a senior year project. Their lab, though, is in Westport. It's a few miles from the waters they test, so they need to factor in manhours for transporting water samples.

So Bloom was putting up a new shellfish processing building on his property on the edge of the Sound. I don't know who asked who, but in any case Bloom ended up donating lab space in that building to Earthplace, so they could test the waters more easily. He even lets them use dock space for their boat.

Here's a photo I took of Dick Harris, Harbor Watch/ River Watch Director, at the new lab:



The new lab, right on the water, will enable the Earthplace team to work more quickly. As an example of what they can do, they told me that last summer they had been doing their regular testing and noticed a dramatic spike in bacteria levels.

They quickly shifted into detective mode.

What would cause such a spike? There hadn't been significant rain, so they figured it wasn't runoff. Standard seepage wouldn't cause such a big spike. There had to have been a change somewhere in one of the storm drains. Because they test so often and so regularly, they were able to quickly narrow down the general area of the source of the problem.

A check with the city's building department uncovered that some construction was going on in that area. The building department had gotten a recent call from a contractor with a question about the location of sanitary and storm drains. Aha! There must have been a mixup -- the contractor had inadvertently connected a sanitary line to the storm drain. That was it! The repair was done, the levels returned to normal, and the Sound was safe again. The detective work had taken a mere four hours.

Bloom's happy, the Earthplace scientists are happy, the student interns are happy, and the large population who lives near the Sound is happy. And of course, the shellfish are happy. Until they get eaten, I guess.