A ‘laymans terms’ version of the report on Scarborough South Bay’s poor water quality has been presented to the borough council’s cabinet.
The source of the pollution is being investigated, with the causes already being identified as faeces from dogs, seagulls and even humans.
This was unexpected following significant investment by Yorkshire Water in 2014 to improve bathing water quality.
In response to the result, investigations by Yorkshire Water and the Environment Agency have established that the discharge from the outfall at Wheatcroft could have more impact on water quality than had been previously thought.
In addition it has become clear that there may be a number of other sources of bacteria impacting on the bathing water quality which is known to be impacted by occasional high peaks in bacterial contamination.
This investigation sought to establish any similarities and relationships between the bacteria present in a number of identified potential sources around Scarborough Bay and the bacteria found at the bathing water at Scarborough South.
The key conclusions are: The final effluent discharging from the Wheatcroft outfall contains high numbers of bacteria and that these were found on occasion, but not consistently, in the bathing water at Scarborough South.
A marker associated with dogs was found in 2 of the samples taken from Scarborough South.
But they work very closely with Yorkshire Water because they have all the sewage assets.
It’s a case of identifying the sources.