Pflugerville Plant Malfunction Leads To Another Fish Kill

PFLUGERVILLE, TX — A mechanical pump failure on Monday — the second in five months, after city officials vowed to implement measures preventing such mishaps — resulted in another fish kill at Gilleland Creek and a warning for residents to stay away from the inlet.

City officials quietly alerted residents in a brief statement on the Pflugerville municipal website on Wednesday, two days after the latest spill: "On August 19, 2019, the City of Pflugerville was notified by Southwest Water Company about a mechanical pump failure at the Windermere Wastewater Utility Plant resulting in a fish kill on Gilleland Creek which flows eastward through Pflugerville. In an abundance of caution, the City recommends staying clear of the Gilleland Creek."

There was no word on what was leaked into the creek, the estimated number of fish killed or details on the time that elapsed before the malfunction was detected before the creek was compromised yet again.

Patch reached out to city spokeswoman Maggie Holman in trying to secure a more substantive account. In response, city communications director Terri Toledo referred all further questions to a public relations company handling damage control for Southwest Water Co.

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Subsequently, Patch received a prepared statement from Gary Rose, director of operations at the Windermere Utility: “On Monday, August 19, at approximately 8:30 p.m., we discovered a pump failure at our Windermere Utility wastewater treatment plant. Unfortunately, the decrease of dissolved oxygen in the water, combined with extreme summer heat, resulted in the death of fish in Gilleland Creek. Our crews took immediate action and worked overnight to correct oxygen levels in the water and to collect the impacted fish they could find. This event was promptly reported to the City of Pflugerville and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ)."

The utility expressed regret at the incident while stressing their commitment to environmental protection: “Windermere Utility is committed to the highest standards of environmental stewardship, and we regret this incident occurred," Rose wrote. "Our operators will continue to monitor the stream over the next several days and we are developing a plan to help ensure this type of event does occur in the future.”

Monday's malfunction comes a mere five months after 3.4 million gallons of chlorinated water were discharged into Gilleland Creek — resulting in a fish kill then too. Through a formal request for information from TCEQ, Patch first reported that the spill led to a $33,000 fine against the city — a penalty the city has declined to pay in spite of the formal order.

The March spill was blamed on a mechanical failure of a dechlorination pump at the City of Pflugerville Gilleland Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, according to a city press release at the time. After advising the public, the city removed the advisory from the municipal website. . "This news has expired," a notation reads on the link that once allowed residents to secure details on the Gilleland Creek spill along with safety tips to avoid ingestion and contact with the affected water.

In gathering information on the March spill, Holman made assurances the city had taken measures to prevent another such breach from happening again: "The City of Pflugerville Public Works Department received the letter from TCEQ and we are evaluating our options," Holman wrote in response to queries from Patch. "We are committed to making sure this does not happen in the future."

The two recent malfunctions aren't the first time such glitches have compromised the water quality at Gilleland Creek:

• In 2014, more than a million gallons of untreated sewage flowed into Gilleland Creekin the early morning hours of a Sunday after a power outage disabled a Pflugerville wastewater treatment plant, according to the Austin American-Statesman. Residents were issued safety tips in the aftermath of that spill, particularly to those with private drinking water supply wells within a half-mile of the spill site or one mile downstream, according to the report.
• The following year, a contractor inadvertently ruptured an 8-inch water main that caused a spill of 560,000 gallons of chlorinated water into the creek. According to information found on the City of Pflugerville website, a Texas Parks and Wildlife investigation found the 2015 discharge killed about 1,575 fish. The restitution value of the lost fish and investigation cost was calculated at the time to be $1,047, city officials reported at the time.