Alberto puts St. Pete sewers to the test

ST. PETERSBURG (FOX 13) - Tropical Storm Alberto put the upgrades made to St. Petersburg's sewage system to the test.  Bill Logan, spokesman for St. Pete Public Works, says the city had no spills or problems over the weekend.

The summer of 2016 was a different story. Stormwater made its way into the city's sewage pipes and the system couldn't handle the excess water. It resulted in partially-treated sewage being dumped into the bay.

Since then, the city says it has overhauled the system, spending more than $100 million to upgrade its plants and more storage capacity.

They say heavy rain from Alberto on the already-saturated ground could have done some real damage.

“If what happened this past weekend happened a couple of years ago, there may have been some issues of hitting a limit of at-capacity. This weekend it wasn’t an issue,” Logan said.

However, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection reports Hillsborough County did have a minor incident during the worst of this weekend's weather.

The Van Dyke treatment plant saw a relatively small overflow of 5,000 gallons of raw sewage during high flow times.