Sewer in London’s East End Menaced by Giant Fatberg
- 7 years ago
Sewer in London’s East End Menaced by Giant Fatberg
It was discovered to the east of the city’s financial district, occupying a sixth of a mile of sewer under Whitechapel Road, between one of London’s largest mosques
and a pub called the Blind Beggar, where walking tours are taken to reminisce about a notorious gangland murder.
Joseph Bazalgette, who designed the Victorian network, probably did not account for the disposable diapers
and wipes that, in a matter of days, can mate with oil and grease to create fatbergs big enough to block tunnels that are six feet tall.
The sewer under Whitechapel Road is about four feet high
and less than three feet wide, and Thames Water engineers found the fatberg there during a routine check.
To prevent the contents of the sewer from flooding streets
and homes nearby, the utility is sending an eight-member team to break up the fatberg with high-powered jet hoses and hand tools.
The backbone of the network was built in the 19th century, after a series of cholera outbreaks
and the “Great Stink” of 1858, when lawmakers abandoned the Houses of Parliament because of the stench of raw sewage from the nearby River Thames.
That is 10 times the size of a similar mass that the company found beneath Kingston,
in South London, in 2013, and declared the biggest example in British history.
It has said that it clears three blockages from fat, and four or more caused by items like wipes, every hour
“It’s a total monster and taking a lot of manpower and machinery to remove,” said Thames Water’s head of waste networks, Matt Rimmer.
It was discovered to the east of the city’s financial district, occupying a sixth of a mile of sewer under Whitechapel Road, between one of London’s largest mosques
and a pub called the Blind Beggar, where walking tours are taken to reminisce about a notorious gangland murder.
Joseph Bazalgette, who designed the Victorian network, probably did not account for the disposable diapers
and wipes that, in a matter of days, can mate with oil and grease to create fatbergs big enough to block tunnels that are six feet tall.
The sewer under Whitechapel Road is about four feet high
and less than three feet wide, and Thames Water engineers found the fatberg there during a routine check.
To prevent the contents of the sewer from flooding streets
and homes nearby, the utility is sending an eight-member team to break up the fatberg with high-powered jet hoses and hand tools.
The backbone of the network was built in the 19th century, after a series of cholera outbreaks
and the “Great Stink” of 1858, when lawmakers abandoned the Houses of Parliament because of the stench of raw sewage from the nearby River Thames.
That is 10 times the size of a similar mass that the company found beneath Kingston,
in South London, in 2013, and declared the biggest example in British history.
It has said that it clears three blockages from fat, and four or more caused by items like wipes, every hour
“It’s a total monster and taking a lot of manpower and machinery to remove,” said Thames Water’s head of waste networks, Matt Rimmer.