Super Smell Requires Super Sluething

Custodial and Maintenance Staff Work to Find Source of Sewer Smell

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The mechanical room located beside the basement doors was the source of the odor.

Josie Collier, Staff Reporter

“It’s smelt like sewage. It was awful,” sophomore Jordan Yowell said.

A foul sewer-like smell began permeating the basement classrooms in October. School building manager Matt Titone went through many trials before he found the actual cause of the problem.

“We first thought it was a gasket behind a urinal leaking, so the urinal was pulled off the wall,” Titone said.

When that did not fix it, one of the female custodians found another problem.

“One of the toilets in the girls restrooms could move. We fixed that problem; still there was a smell,” Titone said.

At this point, the custodians had to bring in the county’s heating and air conditioning.  

“Then the custodians found a burned out fan on the roof. We fixed that, but that didn’t resolve it,” Titione said. Three problems were fixed and still the smell was lingering. Until finally, they found it.

They found the smell in the mechanical room, at the bottom of the stairs that come out into the breeze way.“There is a manhole cover where all the sewage from the building leaves and the gasket was rotted away and the odor was backing up from there.” Titone said.

“It took two and half months to find it, but for now we have a temporary fix. We will do a real fix over spring break.”  Titone said.