In this episode, we share a story about a series of pictures. These pictures were not ordinary. In three days they spread around the world. The story starts deep in the sewers of Charleston, South Carolina. It’s pitch black and divers are feeling for an obstruction. Mike Saia, communications manager with Charleston Water System, tells us the story.
A major rain event occurred that dislodged a 12 foot long, three-foot-wide mass of wipes. It weighed hundreds of pounds, and it moved through our deep tunnel to a pump station at our wastewater treatment plant.
Mike Saia
Transcript
Robert Osborne:
Welcome to The OutFall. I’m Robert, and today we share a story about the series of pictures by Charleston Water System last year. These pictures were not ordinary. In three days they spread around the world.
Mike Saia:
At the end of all that, before we know it we were talking to Dr. Oz and there was a major feature in USA Today. They were calling to talk with us about it, and in the end, we garnered more than a billion impressions worldwide.
Robert Osborne:
So what were these pictures, and how did they reach around the world so fast? Well, we talked with Michael Saia, communications manager with Charleston Water System to learn more.
Mike Saia:
Back in October of 2018, a major rain event occurred that dislodged a 12 foot long, three-foot-wide mass of wipes. It weighed hundreds of pounds, and it moved through our deep tunnel to a pump station at our wastewater treatment plant. That big clump basically laid across the bottom of the wet wheel and blocked about 75% of the pump openings, and that caused our 13th [story 00:01:13] deep structure to rapidly fill with wastewater until sewer overflows began in the lowest points of our collection system.
Robert Osborne:
When the divers were ready, the city pumped the wet well down at night when the wastewater flows were at their lowest so that there was only 60 feet or so of wastewater to go through. Easy right? Well …
Mike Saia:
At the top they have to typically break through maybe a foot or two feet of solids, things that should not be flushed at the very top. And once they can get that cage to go through, then they can begin their dissent. When they get in it’s actually a little bit cold, and it’s total darkness. A flashlight would not help them. Light doesn’t help them in any way, and they just wait as the cage takes about 45 minutes to descend to the bottom. They explain it as getting gradually hotter and hotter and hotter till they reach the bottom, because just like a compost pile that steams in the winter, wastewater is cooking at the very bottom as well. So it’s extremely warm at the very bottom.
Mike Saia:
On their way down and as they begin their work they’re very careful not to bump into anything that may be sharp, because all the divers I spoke with explained what it’s like when they get a gash in the side of their suit and it instantly fills with waste water from their neck to their toes.
Robert Osborne:
Oh man.
Mike Saia:
So then they have to begin the ascent up, but that might be 45 minutes again while they’re just sitting there in a suit filled with wastewater. But while they’re down there they had to feel around with their hands in raw sewage, in total darkness to identify the obstruction and load it into buckets that could be raised up to the surface. It took about three dives to remove the wipes. So they were in continuous laying across the pump intakes basically like a big, big wet towel. So it took many dives to remove the additional grit and gravel and other solids from the bottom of the wet well. It was quite a Herculean effort. In short, we spent about $142,000 to remove that clog and that additional grit just over a three or four day period.
Robert Osborne:
Unfortunately, this was not just a one-time occurrence. The water system, just like a lot of utilities, has been dealing with wipes through the years. However, they did something different this time, and it only took 10 minutes or so.
Mike Saia:
On Monday we decided to let people know why we were having so many SSOs in the community. We just threw together a quick series of five different funny and educational social media posts to Facebook and Twitter to talk about how wipes clog pipes. It took about maybe two minutes max to get it all online, and as the day went on local and TV print media saw those posts. They reposted them and asked us to do a handful of interviews.
Mike Saia:
By that night the Charleston community was really buzzing about it, and a lot of community education was getting done. We were very excited. But Tuesday morning when we woke up we started to see countless hits online, and it became a top regional news story by the next morning.
Speaker 3:
And a warning now about flushable wipes and flushing them down the toilet. These pictures are from Charleston and their water system there in South Carolina. They had to send divers 80 feet down into raw sewage to clear it-
Speaker 4:
Today Charleston Water suffered a massive pump clog affecting the entire city. The culprit, so-called flushable wipes. Look at these photos. This is what workers fished out of the pumps tonight, and now Charlotte Water confirming flushed wipes are causing major issues here at home as well. And it could end up costing you.
Speaker 5:
NBC Charlotte’s Savannah Levins …
Mike Saia:
When we woke up on Wednesday we realized on the morning news that our story was included in the national packages of each network TV station.
Amy Anderson:
That’s incredible.
Mike Saia:
So it was on everyone’s morning news, it was on their midday news, it was on the evening news, the nightly news at dinnertime. And also once that happened we started to get calls from Fox News, New York Times, just about every other major newspaper. And also all the syndicated newspapers across the country.
Mike Saia:
We could not keep up with all the media requests. We were doing everything we could just simply to answer these inquiries, and then by Thursday it went global. We were talking to the London Times, media outlets across Europe, the Borneo Times, Australia, you name it. And by the end of all that, before we knew it we were talking to Dr. Oz and there was a major feature in the US today. They were calling to talk with us about it, and in the end we garnered more than a billion impressions worldwide. And most importantly to our utility, we reached all of our customers at least six times each.
Robert Osborne:
I think we’ve all seen pictures of fatbergs and wipe clogs in pipes before, but we asked Mike why did he think those pictures resonated so well online. Also, did they make a difference?
Mike Saia:
We think it went viral because we humanized every aspect of the situation. We really hit upon the senses of sight and touch by describing every squishy detail of the event and the experience from the divers’ perspective, and that really allowed the public to imagine themselves diving down into 80 feet of raw sewage in total darkness and feel around with their own hands to physically wrestle out hundreds of pounds of other people’s waste covered wipes. And frankly, we depicted a very graphic scene.
Mike Saia:
Sometimes we wondered if we were offering too many details, but I can say that the public asked for more and more at every turn. We tried to hold back to be civil, but they asked for more and more. In some instances we gave it to them, and some things we just couldn’t because it was far too gross.
Mike Saia:
The question is did all this exposure really have any benefit for our utility. I can tell you that other than checking a box for a wipes clog pipe campaign, sadly it didn’t. Our wastewater collection team still removes the same amount of wipes as they always have.
Mike Saia:
A funny twist, my father actually called me after it had been out there for a few days, and he said, “You wouldn’t believe there is a huge clog in the wastewater sewer system. I saw it on the nightly news.”
Amy Anderson:
Thanks dad.
Mike Saia:
I said, “Did you see your son?” And he said, “No, I was just listening to it.” So he didn’t even know that we were involved, but what that means is a 70 year old guy in Pennsylvania was educated about wipes, and he’s a guy who has a pack on the top of the toilet in his bathroom to be honest with you. He didn’t know himself, and he got educated. A whole lot of people did, and the shocker for us is that we didn’t see a darn bit of difference here. I don’t hear any other utilities saying, “Wow, wipes have disappeared from our wastewater collection system,” either.
Mike Saia:
I think changing behavior is … I don’t know if it’s impossible, and I don’t know if the only answer is simply doing it on the packaging in a big and bold way or eliminating the opportunity for manufacturers to put it on their packaging. But we got the word out around the world, and we haven’t seen a bit of difference anywhere.
Amy Anderson:
Thanks for joining us today on The Outfall, and thanks to Mike Saia for sitting down to talk with us and share the Charleston Water story. If you’d like to see these viral images yourself, visit the show notes for links to the post.
Amy Anderson:
On behalf of Robert and David, thank you so much for joining us on our very first season of The Outfall. We’ve had a wonderful time talking to people who have brought us their water stories from many different places, even all the way from the International Space Station. We’ve looked at modeling water in a lab to worldwide water predictions for the future, and we’d love to hear your thoughts about this season. Leave us a comment on Apple podcast, and we’d love to read it.
Amy Anderson:
We’re already starting to work on season two, so look out for it starting in March. Until next time, this is Amy and thanks from all of us for a great first season of The Outfall.
