What turned a Coralville creek pink?

CORALVILLE — When a person walking along the Clear Creek Trail in Coralville on an unseasonably warm day last week spotted a bubble-gum pink stream, he snapped a picture.

“What would cause that?” he texted a Gazette reporter.

The newspaper forwarded the picture to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. That email launched a 24-hour response from Eastern Iowa emergency managers intent on keeping pollution out of Iowa’s waterways.

The Iowa DNR has filed nearly 100 enforcement actions so far this year against companies or individuals who violated Iowa laws designed to protect Iowa’s environment. Cities and counties also work to stop discharges and hold offenders accountable. But critics say there isn’t enough enforcement and the fines are too small to deter future violations.

We’ll look at the Coralville spill and its cleanup, detailed in a report to the Iowa DNR, as an example of how Iowa regulators work to halt and remedy spills and what Iowans can do to help.

What to do if you see a spill

If you see what you think might be an environmental spill — whether it’s manure, gasoline or some other material — emergency responders want you to report it right away. The sooner they know about a leak, spill or other discharge, the sooner they can stop it and start cleanup.

If you live in Cedar Rapids, you can call the Stormwater Pollution Hotline at (319) 286-5815 or the Cedar Rapids Police Department’s non-emergency number at (319) 286-5491.

If you have Mobile CR app, you can file a written notification.

Johnson County officials recommend calling 911. Dispatchers will alert first responders, who can decide what level and speed of response is necessary.

If you live outside an urban area and spot a spill, fish kill or other environmental discharge, call the Iowa Department of Natural Resources’ 24-hour spill hotline at (515) 725-8694. People may file a report anonymously.

Calling 911 is acceptable if you believe there is an emergency situation, officials said.

To help responders find the location, consider dropping a pin using the maps feature on your phone or note nearby cross streets. Take photos.

Dec. 7

4:16 p.m.: A pedestrian sends The Gazette a text with a photo of a pink stream just east of the Tom Harkin Trailhead in Coralville.

4:28 p.m.: The Gazette forwards the photo and a map of the area to the Iowa DNR’s Region 6, based in Washington. Supervisor Kurt Levetzow responds within minutes, saying he will reach out to an on-call employee.

Dec. 8

8:17 a.m.: Amy Foster, Coralville’s stormwater coordinator, gets an email about the pink stream. She goes to try to find the area, the report states.

8:46 a.m.: Foster and Dave Clark, Coralville’s sewer superintendent, find the section of stream. It’s an unnamed tributary to Clear Creek, Coralville’s largest creek, which feeds into the Iowa River. They start trying to locate the source of the discharge.

“The first step is to get it turned off,” Foster told The Gazette. “I called our assistant engineer to find out where all the storm drains go. We're all just crazy looking for this to see where this is coming from.”

Storm drain maps show a limited geographic area draining to that stream. Officials open various maintenance hole covers to try to narrow down the location.

8:50 a.m.: Clark and Street Superintendent Eric Fisher investigate to see how far downstream the water is pink and see if the contamination has reached Clear Creek.

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9:12 a.m.: Foster visits Club Car Wash, at 2015 Second St., in Coralville, and asks the manager if there has been a spill. She sees a hose coming from a wash pit inside the car wash into the parking lot.

“I could see the pump right there, discharging,” she said. “I'm like ‘This! This! This is it. You can't do that. You pumped all that liquid directly to the creek’.”

The manager told Foster he thought the storm drain was “secure,” the report states.

9:20 a.m.: Clark and Fisher report the discharge has reached Clear Creek.

9:36 a.m.: Foster calls Maxwell Construction, an Iowa City-based utility contractor, to request help cleaning up the discharge.

10 a.m.: Maxwell Field Supervisor Chad Digmann arrives and the team develops a plan to isolate the contamination and pump polluted water out of the stream.

“You build an earthen dam and then you get an big vac truck and vacuum out the liquid,” Foster said. “One pipe that is sucking, another pipe going to the sanitary system so it (contaminated water) could be processed and cleaned.”

12:30 p.m.: Maxwell begins pumping out contaminated water. At 2,000 gallons a minute for 120 minutes, the team pumps out about 240,000 gallons of pink water before flushing the area with clean water, the report states.

“If we were able to pull out 240,000 gallons, I can assume it's been happening for a while,” Foster said.

Runoff from a car wash could include degreaser and antimicrobial soap, as well as toxins from cars, including gasoline, grease, paint particles, brake pad residue and salt, Foster said. All of those materials can harm wildlife as well as microorganisms and plants in the stream ecosystem.

Because it’s been dry, the pink water had pooled in some areas, which lessened the spread of the contaminants, Foster said. It doesn’t appear the incident caused a fish kill, she said.

3 p.m.: City officials go back to Club Car Wash to get samples from the pit near the car wash entrance. These samples go to the State Hygienic Laboratory for testing.

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3:30 p.m.: The Coralville Fire Department flushes clean water through the storm drains upstream. About 60,000 gallons of light pink water from flushing were vacuumed up downstream.

4 p.m.: Pumping stops when the water runs clear.

Enforcing pollution laws

Foster told The Gazette she plans to cite Club Car Wash with an illicit discharge into the storm sewer, which carries a $1,000 fine. She also will ask the car wash to pay for the cleanup, which could be as much as $10,000.

“It should not be on the taxpayer for the time I had to spend dealing with this or Maxwell's time,” she said.

The Iowa DNR also issued a notice of violation Thursday to the car wash. Further enforcement action from the agency is pending. The Iowa DNR’s maximum fine for enforcing environmental laws is $10,000. The agency can ask the Environmental Protection Agency to refer a case to the Iowa Attorney General, which can seek higher penalties, but it’s rare.

“When you think about these issues, there are two factors that are critical. One is the size of the penalties and the other is the probability of getting caught,” said Silvia Secchi, a professor of Geographical and Sustainability Sciences at the University of Iowa.

Iowa has many rural areas without close oversight of environmental regulators, which means many illicit discharges likely go undetected, Secchi said. Rather than having “ridiculously low” fines, Iowa should increase maximum penalties to deter future offenses, she said.

Car wash admits discharge

Club Car Wash General Counsel Ed Orr said Thursday the Columbia, Mo., company takes responsibility for the discharge.

“This was our mistake,” he said. “It was not intentional. The people involved, including the CEO and I, have apologized to the city through the people handling it over there. We're in communication and working with the city of Coralville and Department of Natural Resources and EPA.”

Orr said the red dye that made the creek pink is non-toxic. He also thinks the volume of water discharged is much less than estimated by Foster.

Instead of clearing a clog in the drainage trench, employees at the Coralville location started draining the pit into the parking lot, thinking the drainage maintenance hole went to the sanitary sewer, not to the creek, Orr said.

“We train for these things, but we're obviously retraining and making sure boots on the ground have the necessary tools to not let this happen again,” he said.

Iowa City cited another Club Car Wash, at 919 Highway 1, for illicit discharges twice since 2021.

“The facility’s sand/grit tank’s discharge line was clogged, preventing wash water from discharging into the facility’s sanitary service line,” the March 25, 2022, citation states. “The recaptured wash water was being discharged via sump pumped onto the site’s southwest exit drive, where it flowed overland into a storm sewer inlet.”

The “retention basin’s confined water displayed a red color, due to the red dye ingredient in the carwash’s prewash soap blend,” Iowa City officials noted.

Orr said that incident had a much smaller impact, but indicates the need for continued training of young staff.

Comments: (319) 339-3157; erin.jordan@thegazette.com