Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.) 1910-1922, 1917-08-15
CHIEF ENGINEER
ROBERT B. MORSE
Says Water Supply At Camp Meade
Is Not Purified.
WHAT sCUT" PLANT DOES
Replies To Federal Engineers Criticism
On Supply For Camp
Meade.


Robert B. Morse, chief egineer of the
sanitary division of that body. yes
terday. they would not be approveG
and no permits would be issued for
the work"
In strong reply TO the Federal en-
gineers. Mr.. Morse, who pointed TO the
danger from sewage effiuent pollu
ton at Camp Meade, answered their
criticism that his disposal plant at
the House of Correction would ''puri-
fly the sewage which flows into the
Little Patuxent from Dorseys Run.
II is not purified. he added but mere
~ robbed of some of the bacteria to
keep ii from becoming nuisance.
In full, Mr.. Morse declared:
Naturally the engineers doing the
work at the cantonment would mini
mize the danger of taking its water
supply from the Little Patuxent river
at Welchs Bridge. 1t is entirely true,
as Major Proctor states, at the Mary
land House of Correction a sewage
disposal plant has been designed, and
is now being constructed under my
direction II is not true, however,
that ample provision has been made
for the disposal of sewage from the
institution if water supply is to be
taken from a stream as small as the
Little Patuxent river as point about
four miles below the outlet from the
sewage disposal plant at the Mary
land House of Correction.
MANY people, and, unfortunately,
some engineers, talk glibly about the
publication of sewage when treated
in a disposal plant. ! explained in
detail the methods of sewage treat
ment which were to be used at the
Maryland House of Correction, stat
ing that settling tanks and sprinkling
filters were the devices to be con-
structed. and that the object of such
an installation was not to effect
condition of comparative bacterial
safety in the stream INTO which the
effiuent was to be discharged, but
merely to insure that the liquid from
the institution would not create a
nuisance in the stream, nor render 1t
unfit for the ordinary purposes to
which it might naturally be put in
a sparsely populated section. While
a plant of this type may be expected
to reduce the bacterial count by, per-
haps, from so to 95 per cent, such
bacterial reduction is incidental, and
the efiuent will contain anywhere
from about $4,000 to several hundred
thousand bacteria per cubic cent?
meter 1t is thus readily apparent
that the sewage is not purified in the
component of drinking water, even
though it is to be treated in water
filtration plant, unless large dilution
be provided.
AT the time the disposal plant was
designed, and even after its construc-
ton had been started, there was no
prospect that water for drinking pur-
poses would ever be taken from any
stream into which the effluent would
be discharged. II further treatment
has to be given the sewage from the
Maryland House of Correction, even
luOuEA II OC QlS1AlCStAOA uAOnCs ihC
State Board of Prison Control will be
put to a considerable additional ex-
pense over what would have been
necessary if the intake for Camp
Meade had been placed above the out
let of Dorsey Run. The same situa-
ton will obtain in case other disposal
plants are constructed outside the
government reservation and draining
into the Little Patuxent river or its
tributaries above Welchs Bridge.
LAS a matter of fact, from the few
analyses made by this department of
the water from the Little Patuxent
river at Welchs Bridge, it has been
learned that this water, judging by
the standard set by the International
Joint Commission on the Pollution of
Boundary Waters, a commission APP
pointed by the governments of the
United States and Canada, is too
greatly polluted to be safe as raw
water supply for a filtration plant
without placing too great a burden
upon that plant.
Although work is being prose-
cuted as rapidly as possible on the
sewage disposal plant at the Mary
land House of Correction, it is hard
ly probable that the plant can be put
in operation before Camp Meade is
opened, even though the completion
of this camp will not be possible be-
fore October /. Slow delivery of ma
terials, caused to a large extent by
the governments own construction,
has occasioned the delay on this
plant Pending its completion, no
treatment of any appreciate effect
House of Correction
IF the government had constructed
less than a mile of extra supply line
over the length of that now being
built, it could have placed its intake
above Dorsey Run and thus have
avoided the discharge of sewage, or
sewage affiuent, if you please, from
the Maryland House of Correction
and the National Junior Republic,
even though the danger of future pol
luting sources near Annapolis juno
ton would not have been avoided.
Can it be contended by the engineers
for the camp that the construction of
this mile of pipe would have resulted
in more than a comparatively slight
increase in cost and that it would
have delayed in any way the compile
ton of the cantonment, particularly
now as such completion will in any