Advisory for ORILLIA, Ontario

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ORILLIA

Type: Spill  -  Active

Issued: 4/2/2025

Details:

SPILL April 2 When it rains, it pours or catches fire. Late Wednesday night lightning strike sparks fire at Orillias wastewater treatment centre. On top of that, heavy, driving rains dropped more than 50 mm of rain in a short period of time. 

This follows in the aftermath of a devastating weekend ice storm that plunged Southern Ontario into darkness, five days later, nearly 200,000 Ontario residents are still without power. Orillia is in a state of emergency due to the storms impact, as is each of the surrounding townships and the County of Simcoe. 

Due to heavy rains in addition to seasonal snow and ice melt, water levels have exceeded the optimal operation levels for the wastewater system furthermore the damage sustained has affected the normal operation of the treatment system, which is currently not operating at full capacity. The City has been actively working to manage the situation including hauling sewage to alternate facilities in an effort to reduce impacts and work is already underway to repair and restore full function as quickly and safely as possible. Despite these efforts backups are occurring, residents are experiencing sewer backups, odours or slower drainage in some areas aswell, the wastewater system continues to bypass partially treated sewage into Lake Simcoe. This ongoing bypass has the potential to impact private drinking water sources that draw directly from the lake.