By Greg Grisolano
ggrisolano@joplinglobe.com
NOEL, Mo. — When heavy flooding on the Elk River broke open a temporary sewer pipe owned by the city of Noel, the owner of nearby River Ranch Resort said he wasn’t worried about it affecting business.
“We don’t have any business right now,” said Gary Poynor, adding that his resort’s typical opening date of April 1 would probably be delayed by flood cleanup. “We’ve just been cleaning for the last two or three days.”
The sewer line had been constructed above water, but was submerged Tuesday as a deluge of rain pounded extreme Southwest Missouri. It had been built as a temporary replacement for an underwater sewer line that was broken during heavy flooding in January.
According to the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, at 7 p.m. on Jan. 8, wastewater workers discovered that infiltration of floodwater had caused the Noel lift station’s rate of flow to increase from a normal rate of 140,000 gallons per day to about 1 million gallons per day. At 8 p.m., the workers observed that the lift station was continuing to pump, but no flow was entering the plant from the lift-station pipeline. Employees determined that the pipe in the river had either been broken or swept downstream.
Poynor said the city on Saturday was trucking the wastewater from the line to the water treatment plant, the same plan officials adopted to deal with the previous ruptured pipe.
Globe efforts to ascertain when the pipe would be fixed were unsuccessful Saturday. Phone calls to Larry Bice, head of the city’s wastewater-treatment plant, at home and at the plant, were not returned Saturday.
Noel Mayor Paul Gardner said Saturday that there was no danger to the city’s drinking water.
“Our water is safe to drink, period,” he said.
Poynor said some of his cabins had as much as eight feet of water in them at the apex of flooding last week.
“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” he said. “I’ve got bulldozers and carpenters coming in first thing Monday.”
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