6,000 tons of sand being removed from major Macomb County sewer pipe

Some 1,000 tons of contaminated “beach sand” has been removed thus far from a main Macomb County sewer drain that was site of the infamous Fraser sinkhole, according to Macomb County Public Works officials.

Workers for the contractor, Oscar Renda Contracting, have been painstakingly scooping up and removing the sediment – darkened sand – from the Macomb Interceptor Drain, located approximately 60 feet below the surface of 15 Mile Road in Sterling Heights, the site of the Christmas Eve 2016 sinkhole that cost $75 million and took nine months to fix.

The removal is the start of the removal of an estimate 6,000 tons of sand that should improve and increase sewage flow and is part of a $37 million project to reinforce more than one mile of pipe to prevent any sinkholes in the foreseeable future. The work required building a more than 60 foot shaft into the ground to access the pipe.

“Six thousand tons of this in our interceptor reduces the amount of capacity that we have for our sewage flow. It has to come out,” Macomb County Public Works Commissioner Candice Miller said in a news release. “It’s a big part of the project – a very important part.”

The 11-foot-diameter pipe carries sewage from homes of nearly 600,000 Macomb County residents who are part of the Macomb Interceptor Drainage District (MIDD).

Miller in a video called the sediment “like beach sand” that 40,000 years ago was likely was part of a water shore. After the blackened sand is removed, it returns to the color of beach sand within “a day or two,” Miller said. The reason for the change in color of the contaminated sediment is unknown but it is hauled to and disposed of at Pine Tree Acres landfill in New Haven, officials said.

The presence of sediment was previously noted during inspections of the large pipe from around Garfield Road to Hayes Road, officials said. In some areas, the sediment is 24 to 36 inches thick.

To remove the sand, sewage is temporarily held back upstream several times each week to allow for sufficient space inside the pipe for the construction contractor to drive a bulldozer-like rig – known as a “skid-steer” — with a curved blade inside the pipe and scoop the black, sandy debris from the pipe and into large bucket, officials said. Using a crane, that bucket is then slowly hoisted up through the new pump station that was built in the shaft and then dumped into a large roll-off Dumpster.

Macomb County Commissioner Don VanSyckel of Sterling Heights, who serves on the Macomb Interceptor Drain Drainage District board, recently visited the project and got a close look.

“I’m just so glad to help serve on the MIDD Drain board and help to push this project along because it’s high time it gets done,” VanSyckel said.

The project is not expected to increase rates of those in the MIDD. It is being partially funded with $12.5 million received in a lawsuit against three contractors whose mistakes while working in the OaklandMacomb Interceptor sewer to the west caused conditions that eventually led to the 2016 sinkhole. Miller has gained additional federal funding via the state and other sources.

The sinkhole, which took place between Utica and Hayes roads, destroyed one home and caused the temporary evacuation of 21 homes.