Sewage floods stops Oswestry family using garden
The weather may have taken a turn for the better of late, but one mother will not be letting her young daughter play in the garden.
For Sarah Ford's garden was repeatedly flooded with raw sewage over a period of eight months.
The long-running problem came to a head just over a week ago when raw sewage not only appeared again in the garden in West Place, Gobowen, near Oswestry, but also came up through manhole covers in the Fernhill area of the village.
After the long-standing problems were highlighted by a petition signed by hundreds of villagers, Severn Trent discovered a dropped drain was the problem and says it has now fixed it.
But the company has told Ms Hall not to work the soil for the next six months – and as a result she will not be allowing 15-month-old Lilian to play outside in the garden.
Miss Ford and partner Mark had spent many hours cultivating their garden with gravel paths and flower beds and vegetables – only to see their hard work ruined by the effluent.
Miss Ford says she has been left with a garden contaminated by the sewage.
"How can I let Lilian play in the garden?" she said.
Miss Ford is now be pressing for the manhole to be moved.
She said: "There has been no mention of moving the manhole as they seem quite sure that once they have carried out the repair work I won't have a problem again.
"But as I pointed out, as long as that is in my garden the risk is always going to be there – that something else could go wrong.
"I've been told not to move the soil or do any maintenance to the garden for up to six months.
"What a shame that the garden is all going to all be overgrown again."
Miss Ford said she has been told that the bacteria left over from the sewage floods would be naturally killed off over time by the sun.
"We were told that, apparently, the UV from the sun will break down any residue and kill the bacteria. I await my promised leaflets," she said.
"I honestly cannot believe they didn't pick up on the dropped drain last September when the problem reared its head.
"This could have been avoided had they have updated their maps."
Severn Trent was approached for comment but had not responded as the Shropshire Star went to press.
