Photo: Al Price

A sewage lagoon breach on a dairy farm on Salmon River Road has concerned already frustrated Spallumcheen residents in the Hullcar Valley living with a tainted drinking water source.

“I don't know how much of the liquid manure got out onto the ground but it's thousands and thousands of gallons,” said Al Price of the Save the Hullcar Aquifer Team (SHAT). “There were two huge, black streams through the white snow surrounding the lagoon and it had all pooled down at the base of the hill.”

He watched efforts as a backhoe dug a trench and two vacuum trucks collected the manure – one putting the stuff back into the lagoon and the other spreading it onto a field.

Residents have been demanding the province act to end farm practices that they believe have led to the cancer-causing nitrates in their drinking water, leaving them on a water advisory for almost three years.

“It started on Thursday afternoon,” confirmed Spallumcheen Mayor Janice Brown shortly before she left to look at the scene late Saturday afternoon. “The Ministry of Environment has been there. The Ministry of Health has been there. We've been notified.

“It sounds like the lagoon is overflowing and the field of concern is brown. The Ministry of Environment says the farm is in non-compliance.”

Brown had no further details.

While the ground is still frozen, Price said the spill is still a cause for concern.

“It borders Splatsin First Nation (land) and the aquifer is very close to the surface at the west end of the valley,” said Price. “It has been thawing and they are spreading whatever they can suck up on the fields. It will get into the aquifer at some point.”