Todays News, Biohazard Beaches closed/reopened 24 hours

[William Djubin]

Congratulations to South Florida for testing the Waters where the public swims and closing the Beaches due to the pollution we allow to flow into our Oceans.
Dept of Health for Dade County, you are the heroes today.

Not a lot of News exists out there regarding Public Safety and the TMDL program, however Beaches in Dade County Florida were closed due to high levels of fecal coliform and enterococci.
12 Miami Beaches Closed Due to Bacteria - Science - redOrbit

Funny the Dept of Health reopened these beaches in less than 24hours.
Miami News, Fort Lauderdale News, Florida News & Weather Channel 7 Fox Miami WSVN-TV - Local News - Swim advisory lifted for all South Florida beaches

I decided to investigate similar outbreaks that have caused Beaches and Public areas to close after the Health Boards took Water Quality Monitoring Samples in June 2008.
Its not just Florida.

And I found the Mother Load on this site.

Early Warning Inc - Biohazard Outbreaks

What a lot of information on 1 web page. Enjoy.

If we tested all of our Ocean Coastal waters we would be very surprise at the results of high toxins.
Remember to always shower with soap after swimming in Florida’s waterways, for the health of your family.

Water Quality Monitoring needs to be addressed for TMDL in all of our Water Bodies.

[William Djubin]

I wanted to explain why I posted such a difficult situation.
This is not a scare tactic to promote Global Climate Change effects.

Rather a celebration for the Government Offices, mostly Dept of Health, for actually doing Water Testing for the publics safety and then closing Beaches.

Water Quality Monitoring and Reporting is still in its developmental stages. The current TMDL system is flawed.

Could you image the results if these same Water bodies were also tested for: ( by the EPA and DEP )

Sulfur
Ammonium
Nitrogen
Phosphate
Mercury

[SwitchBlade]

I work in the storm water industry. To amplify, the source of most of the contamination is run-off from inland, not what is happening on the beach. In addition, not to belittle human caused contamination, a significant source of bacterial contamination is caused by bird droppings. However, your advice:
"Remember to always shower with soap after swimming in Florida’s waterways, for the health of your family." applies to ALL beaches as you imply with "Its not just Florida."

Many other locations do test the water at the beaches. I'd be more surprised to find ones that don't test. Other major problem areas include (but are not limited to) Southern California and the west coast of Florida.

[include]

Good post SwitchBlade, interesting stuff.

[Myrtti]

I've spent a few summers taking water samples from public beaches. Our lakes are supposed to have excellent water and we still have minor probelms with things like enterobacteria every now and then. So I can only imagine just how "minor" the probelm can be in some places. And I don't know what the situation is in the rest of the world, but at least here we have to monitor the water quality because the law says so.

[forfismum]

Yes indeed very interesting. The mention of birds being the source of contamination is important and maybe more widespread than reported.I was presented with a problem many years back of maggots dropping into the work and packing area of one of the factories my company owned.Major hassle with this one as the factory made fancy undergarments for the high end of the market! One maggot in a pair of knickers and the papers would have a field day. [I was Company Engineer,but all sorts of problems came my way ]
So to the birds.The problem was caused by seagulls which came to roost on the nice warm roof at night but which inconveniently died from a strain of botulism and fell into the roof valleys,became infested with flies whose larvae wriggled into the roof space.Yuk. So off forfi and team go to find solution.Nearest feeding place to said factory [as we thought]was a landfill or open bloody tip some 5 miles distant.This seemed a long way for the birds to travel for a place to roost and a post-mortem on a few samples did not show up the botulism we had earlier found.After a period of observation we noticed that our gulls were not coming form the direction of the obvious feeding sites and we traced them to a fish handling unit nearby which had broken its permissions and had fish offal in open containers.End of our problem.
Point is that landfill sites attract large flocks of gulls and that these birds pick up so many diseases to list here.Not their fault of course.Since then the better run land-fill sites cover the trash with top-soil on a constant basis and no more gulls. I guess that was one of my first introductions to the importance of understanding ecology.

[forfismum]

PS forgot to mention that the land-fill that we checked out was on an estuary near some beaches close to Dublin which are very popular with familes in summer

[SwitchBlade]

Since we’re trading interesting stories

The upper Potomac River (up stream from Washington D.C.) is mostly natural right next to the river. However, there are some farms and a few housing developments near the river, and some developments further away, that have storm drainage running untreated into the river. The Potomac River empties into the Chesapeake Bay. And, since the Chesapeake Bay is one of the most economically valuable fishing and sporting areas in the country; as well as being ecologically necessary for filtering water (marshland, clams, mussels etc.), and one of the most ecologically stressed areas, the Potomac River is regularly tested for various contaminates.

One of the contaminates tested for is fecal coliform. Several years ago, the allowable contaminate level was set at a particular level that was designed to force storm water runoff to be cleaned before running into the river. The problem was that when these levels were evaluated, it was pointed out by a biologist that the level was at level lower than what would be expected from the birds, deer, bear, etc. that lived along the banks of the river (the “background” level). The levels were revised.

[forfismum]

Thanks for that SwitchBlade,again we see the importance of understanding Ecology.

[Wobs]

Originally Posted by SwitchBlade

Since we’re trading interesting stories

The upper Potomac River (up stream from Washington D.C.) is mostly natural right next to the river. However, there are some farms and a few housing developments near the river, and some developments further away, that have storm drainage running untreated into the river. The Potomac River empties into the Chesapeake Bay. And, since the Chesapeake Bay is one of the most economically valuable fishing and sporting areas in the country; as well as being ecologically necessary for filtering water (marshland, clams, mussels etc.), and one of the most ecologically stressed areas, the Potomac River is regularly tested for various contaminates.

One of the contaminates tested for is fecal coliform. Several years ago, the allowable contaminate level was set at a particular level that was designed to force storm water runoff to be cleaned before running into the river. The problem was that when these levels were evaluated, it was pointed out by a biologist that the level was at level lower than what would be expected from the birds, deer, bear, etc. that lived along the banks of the river (the “background” level). The levels were revised.

I've found similar situations around here, although we don't have bears in East Yorkshire*.

The testing technique for bathing water quality is fairly simple and crude, but shows not just sewage and industrial pollution, but can show up levels from natural sources.

Much of the sources of elevated levels were from farm runoff, storm overflow, sea birds, cows, etc. The impacts from normal sewage and industrial sources have been greatly reduced.

* - Not sure which I'd rather see- a bear or the sight that used to greet me when I was sampling one particular beach which was an unoffical nudist area (unfortunately all men). Just keep your eye on the sea and keep walking. "Keep playing that guiter please".