TOMAHAWK BEACH

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16610, 5 February 1916, Page 3

TOMAHAWK BEACH

THE AT.LBfIKD POLLUTION. .VISIT. BY DRAINAGE BOARD. v NOTHING OFFENSIVE DISCOVERED, Coraplaipt has been made lately that tho boach at Tomahawk has suffered pollution through the serwage which is discharged into t(ho sea being washed in again by the tide and scattered over tho wild, Riving rise to offensive odours. Tho drainage ot the city is emptied into the jea at Lawyer's Head, the sewer having two outlets, one ou each side of the head, bo that, when one is blocked by tho sea beating in on it, the matter may be discharged through the other. The suggestion has been that certain currents urove the sewage inland. As a result of the complaints members of the Drainage Board paid a rvisit of inspection to the beach yesterday. Motor cars left tho Post Office at 9 a.m., conveying Messrs J. S. Douglas (chairman), IVV. T. M'Farlane, R. E. Moller, J.. .1. Marlow, J. A. M'Kinnon, J. Arkle, Drs Fulton and Brown, Messrs A. Slinger (engineer) and P. B. Foote (secretary), and press representatives. It was practically low water -when the parly arrived at what is known as the "second Tomahawk Beach," opposite Bird Island. Here a close examination was made of the sand ,-inrl of all the nooks and 1 crannies of the rocks, where jetsam might have been, expected to have lodged. Nothing at all was found except marine growths, of which there was a fair quantity. There •was not the slightest suggestion of any pffensive odour. A couple of members of the party, after a particularly painstaking search, found a few diminutive fragments of what they declared was nightsoil, though others present held that they could not be definitely identified as such. Samples of them were taken back to town in a bottle for examination.

A walk was tihen taken along the Tomahawk Beach to Lawyer's Head, the party inspecting the beach thoroughly at all points, especially at high-water mark, ■where the residue from the sea might have been expected to have been left. A ihin film of jelly-like sea matter was fonnd in a long streak along the beach., bat although it might, on hasty inspection, have been taken for greasy scam, closer scrutiny clearly revealed its nature. It •was odourless, but it might, conceivably, give forth, an offensive smell under a hot sun. The rocks and cliffs, as far as could, be seen, were free from poilutian. A visit was also paid to the beach on the St. Kilda side of the Lawyer's Head, bat here, also, there was a complete absence of pollution. 4 , About a year ago similar complaints ■were made of alleged pollution from the sewage outfall, and the suggestion was made that it should be shifted from Lawyer's Head to the blnff beyond the "second Tomahawk Beach." It was estimated, howeiyer, that this would cost a very considerable sum of money. Mr Slinger said yesterday that at a cost of £5 or £10 he oonld put in a steel door to cast most of the sewage into the deeper water by the western arm of the outfall, if it were thought necessary to dp anything. ' DISCUSSION AT BOARD MEETING. At a special meeting of the Drainage Board yesterday afternoon the chairman (Mr Douglas) referred to the visit, and directed severe criticism against the action of the press in complaining of pollution there. It was with the utmost pleasure, he said, that members had found nothing whatever in the nature of pollution arising from the board's operations in sewerage. The whole beach was thoroughly examined from Bird Island! point to Lawyer's Head outfall, by various members of the board, accompanied by the engineer the secretary, Dr Brown, Dr Fulton, Mr J. J. Marlow, and representatives of the press. Mr Slinger (their engineer), who had been <fat there last Friday when the pollution was reported, had informed him that the condition then was similar to what they saw that morning. A peculiarlooking substance in the nature of whalefeed and marine growth was to be seen in /various parts of t«he beach, which, when it became dry, was of a rather objectionable smell This, ho felt sure, had been the cause to a large extent for the alarming and unwarranted report •which the press had thought fit to publish. That was his opinion after a thorough, investigation, not only on this but on a former occasion when the same alarm was raised. Members would remember the result of a report on the substance on that occasion made by Mr G. M. Thomson (analyst) 12 months ago. Mr Thomson found the stuff to be probably lumps of kitchen fat which wight have come from a passing vessel, and said he had never examined before qrrite such a dirty mass. He wished to say that the attitude of the press, especially one paper, was what one would expect at the prosent time in Germany. It was a most unfair criticism of a public body. They hit below the belt, and said no matter whether there was any pollution or not they had no intention of opening np or entering into a controversy on the question. One could say a great deal more in defence of and in justification of the board's actions in the past in all aspects raised, but he thought for the present they as a body shoald be pleased that things were not qoito so black as they Lid been painted. Mr Moller said that there was only one thing in the chairman's statement that might give a wrong impression, and that was the word "whale-feed." The majority of people would take {hat to mean red shrimps, and they might say they had seen no shrimps out tihere. His opinion was that one could find 50 times more filth between the Octagon and the Post Office than a dozen men could find poking round on tihe Tomahawk Beach for two hours.

Mr Hamel said he had understood that the sewage discharged at Lawyer's Head ■would; be so broken up and reduced to a state of fluid that there was no possibility of solids in any form finding their way to the beaches. He -wished to ask the engineer if that was so. Mr Slinger replied that there was liqueficaction going on practically all tho time in the sewers, and when the sewage got to tho pumping station it passed a pump travelling at 750 rervolutions a minute that pulverised the sewage. It was, practically speaiking, •in a fluid state when it reached the outfall. Mr Moller referred to little brown knobs of matter they had seen on the beach that morning, and mentioned also that they had soen a tip which was evidently used over Lawyer's Head.

Members agreed' that this practice must be stopped.