A crappy situation made it impossible for customers to eat fresh for at least a few hours on Friday.
Parksville city crews discovered a “suspicious discharge” in the ditch along Highway 19A on Thursday, confirmed Parksville’s director of engineering Vaughn Figueira.
“We took a sample of it, sent it to the lab and got results back showing high levels of fecal coliform.”
Figueira said staff determined there must be a cross connection between the sewage system and storm drainage system on site in Wembley Mall.
“We were able to find all the drainage in the mall was fine except for Subway,” he said. “The owners hired an engineer to figure out how to fix it and what happened.”
Vancouver Island Healthy Authority communications officer Valerie Wilson confirmed Subway’s Wembley Mall location was closed Friday. However, by Saturday morning the sandwich shop was up and running again.
Figueira said a flusher truck was used to suck material out of the ditch and confirmed the discharge poses no threat to the public.
“It’s all been alleviated,” he said late Friday afternoon. “We’ve cleaned it up and quarantined it off.”
Figueira said this is the first time he’s dealt with this type of incident.
Parksville Mayor Marc Lefebvre commended city staff for their quick response and hard work.
“There’s no health concern to the public,” said Lefebvre. “Congrats to staff, this is not the kind of thing you can’t allow, you really have to clean it up as fast as possible.”
