Raising A Stink.

Carnegie thinks that the powers that be should really get their proverbial fingers out and sort this problem for the sake of local residents and visitors alike. It really isn't good enough.

"CONCERNS have been raised that Aberdour may have lost an accolade it has held for the last nine years – due to drains overflowing with raw sewage in a village street. Black Sands had been a Seaside Award holder for nine years, achieving ‘excellent’ water quality since 2003, and ‘good’ water quality preceding that to 1999. However, last summer its award was removed after one of 10 water quality samples did not comply with European guidelines."

Causing a stink.

Carnegie reads that "A WATER company which allowed 120 million litres of raw sewage to be pumped into the Firth of Forth last year has been fined £13,500. The untreated waste was discharged into the water from Edinburgh's main pumping station at Seafield for more than 63 hours before it was fixed. Today a sheriff criticised Thames Water Services, which controlled the station, for failing to have adequate back-up measures in place in the event of a problem."

By Carnegie's reckoning that works out at 0.0291 pence for every litre of sewage the company discharged.

Mistakes happen, as do equipment failures, but not detecting the problem for 63 hours is inexcuseable. Thankfully the leak didn't do a lot of damage to the environement of the Forth or the people living next to it. A small mercy in the whole affair.