Sewage fireball threat in blackout

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Sewage fireball threat in blackout

'03 Harlem near miss

BY DAVID SALTONSTALL
DAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU CHIEF

A sewage treatment plant in Harlem nearly exploded into a "catastrophic" fireball during the 2003 blackout - a disaster only averted by a city worker armed with an old broomstick, new records show.
The dangerous near disaster, never revealed by the city, was detailed this week in federal court documents as part of a plea agreement with the city's Department of Environmental Protection.

Under the deal, the DEP admitted that it failed to maintain backup generators at a sewage treatment plant in Red Hook, Brooklyn - causing some 30 million gallons of raw sewage to dump into the East River during the August 2003 blackout.

But records also show that DEP screwups at another plant, the North River Wastewater Treatment Plant between 137th and 145th Sts. on the Hudson River in Harlem, nearly caused a huge fireball that could have threatened nearby homes.

"We have been advised," wrote U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia in a memo to the court last month, "that this situation created the risk of a catastrophic explosion near a residential neighborhood."

Garcia's investigators concluded that when the blackout hit, the lack of working generators at North River caused a flame that safely burns methane gas at the plant to go out, much like a pilot light going out inside a boiler.

With the burner extinguished, methane gas slowly built up - creating a time bomb that was defused only after "a DEP employee, at considerable risk to himself," lit an old broomstick and reignited the burner, records show.

The actions of the employee - who was not identified in court papers or by the DEP yesterday - assured that "excess gas could be burned off and an explosion avoided," Garcia concluded.

DEP officials yesterday disputed that any real danger existed and argued that the plant is designed to safely vent methane gas, even in the absence of electricity.

"We deny that there could be a catastrophic explosion," said DEP spokesman Charles Sturcken, whose agency agreed to submit to federal oversight of its wastewater operations for three years as a result of lapses exposed in the blackout.

But news of the methane mixup yesterday outraged some Harlem leaders, who as recently as Monday were briefed by DEP officials on plans to install new backup generators at the plant but were not told of any past problems.

"I am disappointed that this has not been known by more people in the community," said Jordi Reyes-Montblanc, chairman of Community Board 9 in West Harlem.

"I'm an old Marine and I have been blown up several times," Reyes-Montblanc added. "So when I read 'catastrophic,' I can really visualize the fires of hell."

Originally published on February 9, 2006