In otherwise horrific news, not only was a dead body found trapped inside a Tijuana pump station, but the corpse “plugged” the structure, causing nearly 14.5 million gallons of raw sewage to leak into the U.S. – specifically, San Diego.
This reportedly occurred throughout the weekend starting on Saturday.
Local station KGTV reports,
The International Boundary Water Commission (USIBWC) said transboundary flows between about 9 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 12, and 8 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 14, brought 14,497,873 gallons of treated and untreated wastewater from Tijuana into the Tijuana River Valley.
Mexico's International Boundary Water Commission (CILA) informed their U.S. counterparts Sunday that a cleanup crew at a pump station discovered a body trapped inside one of the sewage intake screens, causing a backup and sewage to overflow.
‘Police got involved and cordoned off the area preventing any activity in the crime area while the investigation continued. A body was trapped inside the intake screens. This caused trash to build up and plug the structure and overflow into the U.S.,’ the USIBWC's Dawi Dakhil said in an email.
It wasn't immediately clear how the person became trapped in the system.
Mexico water officials cleared the scene on Monday, having constructed a temporary raised bank to help stop the overflow of sewage, according to KGTV.
This, unfortunately, is nothing new for San Diego. As Fox News reports, "Last year, a pipe across the border in Mexico broke, causing millions of gallons of sewage to flow into the Tijuana River and then to the Pacific Ocean, impacting California coastal areas." This occurred in December 2018, with reports that six to seven gallons per day were spilling into the U.S.
Just last month, more than 116 million gallons spilled from Mexico into the Tijuana River over a span of 10 days, causing closures of San Diego’s south beaches.
Fox 5 San Diego reports that "sewage flowing into the Tijuana River has been responsible for closing beaches an average of 300 days a year."