They told us to “drain the swamp” — turns out the swamp is draining itself, right into the Potomac River. Since January 19, a collapsed six-foot concrete sewer pipe near the Capital Beltway and Clara Barton Parkway has dumped nearly 250 million gallons of raw sewage into the waterway that flows past the monuments, past the Capitol, and past the very government buildings where our leaders run the most powerful nation on earth. We’re talking untreated wastewater — complete with E. coli, staph bacteria, toilet paper, and sanitary products — flowing freely into one of the most iconic rivers in America. And it took the District of Columbia 25 days to even bother posting a public health advisory.
Maryland’s Environment and Transportation Committee held a virtual hearing on Friday to get answers from DC Water, state environmental officials, and the Potomac Riverkeeper Network. The news wasn’t good. DC Water says an interim fix is still four to six weeks away, and a full repair project will take nine months. Meanwhile, a bypass system is redirecting wastewater into the historic C&O Canal before pumping it back into the broken interceptor line. Researchers from the University of Maryland confirmed what anyone with a nose already suspected — the land surrounding the spill site is covered in sewage remnants, and simply walking near the contaminated area poses health risks.
Dean Naujoks of the Potomac Riverkeeper Network didn’t sugarcoat the situation, calling the damage potentially “devastating.” He also expressed frustration that DC dragged its feet on public warnings while hundreds of millions of gallons of raw waste poured into the river. Virginia and Maryland only issued their own advisories in the past few days. The pipe belongs to DC Water, but as is always the case with Washington’s messes, the surrounding states are left to deal with the consequences. A massive winter storm froze much of the river and wastewater in the weeks after the collapse, and officials warned that the spring thaw could make contamination levels even worse.
This is Washington, D.C. in a nutshell. The political class lectures the rest of the country about climate change, environmental justice, and infrastructure spending — while their own sewer system literally collapses and poisons the river running through the nation’s capital.
They spent years talking about “building back better,” and they can’t even keep a concrete pipe from crumbling. The Potomac River is now a toxic stew of raw human waste, and the people who are supposed to fix it say it’ll take months. Draining the swamp has never been more literal — or more necessary.
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