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1417 Words Precisely
Fog Index Factor: 6.84
NonFiction
Sewer Rat
Published 1989, Scuba Times Magazine
TrixiePixGraphics
Commercial diving takes all forms, and it isn't always carried out under water.
The city of New York produces perhaps more of one commodity than any other and ironically that product is its most worthless export. It has often been said that New York is, to coin a phrase, full of "it". And "it" is precisely what Master Diver Ron Ault submerged himself in for several years in that city, when he was fresh out of the Navy Experimental Diving Unit, seeking meaningful employment.
The city's old sewer systems were outdated and overloaded, and over the course of many years they built new systems to handle the excess. As these new systems were completed and ready to be put online, it often was necessary to send a diver down to jackhammer out some brick or concrete partition, thereby tying the old and the new together. Sometimes this work could be carried out by regular city employees wearing simple fireman's masks, and merely walking through the tunnels. But often, the new tunnels and pipes would fill with seepage, and a diver was called in. This work was right up Ron's alley, as he was a smaller man, and he could wriggle through those sewer lines like a human Rotor Rooter.
On one particular job, he was instructed to enter a smallish pipe, follow it some 250 feet, and at a particular point, jack-hammer through a cinder block partition. The pipe he was to penetrate was in use, and quite full. Ron dawned his Kirby Morgan, and had his tender pull 300 feet of umbilical hose off the truck. The manhole cover was ceremoniously removed. Ron, dressed in deep sea garb, raised his ever faithful jackhammer above his head, took a deep breath, and plunged headlong into the reeking goo.
Traffic along the busy downtown streets stopped to stare in wonderment at such a bizarre spectacle.
The going was tough. Ron could only wriggle forward by pushing with his legs, which slipped and slid against the greasy inner walls of the pipe. As he moved forward he had to displace his own mass with raw sewage. It was like a bug crawling through a straw choked with mud. He squirmed and grunted along in profound blackness. Occasionally his tender topsides spoke with him, describing the "honeys" who had stopped along the street to watch and giggle.
Ron continued on, determined, his muscles aching as he dragged not only his umbilical, but the heavy air hose that was connected to the jackhammer. The farther he went, the harder became the pull. A quarter inch poly safety line was tied to his ankle, yet Ron soon realized that if something went wrong, the rope would break before he could be pulled back out. If his tender tried to save him, it would be like pulling a patch through a gun barrel the barrel being also full of mud. Ron's tender called out the measurements as the umbilical disappeared into the sidewalk. At 230 feet Ron was exhausted. He clawed his way through a semiviscous hell. Short, pointy objects, unseen in the blackness, poked him and wedged under the seal of his hat. His wrists inside the seals were packed tight with a claylike substance; constantly pushing forward with his arms outstretched had caused that. But finally the tender called down that Ron was at the prescribed point in the pipe.
Ron felt around, moved a few feet more, and located the concrete seal that would open into a portion of the new system. Relieved to be nearly done with such an unpleasant chore, he pushed his pneumatic jackhammer against the seal, and calmly pulled the trigger.
At first he wasn't exactly sure what had occurred there had been a sensation of some kind. Yet now, for no apparent reason, he could not breath. He felt a rumbling in that first second or two and felt himself being gently moved backwards in the pipe. It was curious and he pondered the phenomenon. Then the reality of it smacked home:
The jackhammer had exhausted huge volumes of air, pumped down from the street. The five second blast had not been enough to break through the concrete barrier, yet that trapped air needed to go somewhere So it began moving like some foul, horrendous, gargantuan fart, up the pipe and towards the surface.
In the first instant it had pushed Ron backwards ten feet but presently it found its way around him, and went along on its fateful journey. But the gushing ooze had pulled Ron's Kirby up around his forehead. The hat automatically freeflowed, and caused the sewage to bubble and roll in turmoil about his face. He let go of the jackhammer and tried to move his arms back so that he could get ahold of the mask, and pull it down to his face but the pipe was too narrow, and he couldn't bring his elbows back even to his head. He struggled and gasped. He accidentally opened his mouth a time or two and it filled with something the consistency of a chunky beef stew. Dull pointy things got under his eyelids and forced them open it stung, but it hurt more to close them over the debris. His nostrils were choked with little wads of tissue. When he clenched his teeth his jaws stuck together for a second, like gummed candy between the teeth. He squirmed. He slithered. He choked and gagged as "things" worked their way to the back of his throat. He vomited and choked on that as well. He felt himself gliding along towards the threshold of panic.
Meanwhile, a curious thing began to take place topsides, on the crowded sidewalk. Ron's tender was first to feel the muffled rumblings beneath his feet. He cocked an ear this way and that. He stepped from the platform of the dive truck to the sidewalk and there the rumbling was more pronounced. He noticed idly that the level of the sewage in the manhole had risen a foot "Odd", he thought, but he did not connect the two events at first.
Then there was a definite, ear racking "EEEEeeeecccckkkk" from deep in the bowels of the city.
There was a "KkkkaaGGlluurrpp".
A singular "MMMmmmmmuuuuhhhttt".
A frightening "AAAhhhhhPPnnnuuuugggwwhhhuummmppp".
And a tiny, bubbling squeak.
Finally that pipe let out a deep groaning "FFuuurrruuuhhhttt" like a painful digestive disorder. Then it began.
The fascinated onlookers finally began to comprehend the potential of such a thing, and most turned and started for cover. But it was far too late. The bubbling goo erupted forth like Old Faithful gone mad. It oozed and pulsed once like The Blob, then with a satisfying slurp and a long and gratifying PPoooooooohhh, that stuff shot skyward like Mount St. Helens, and covered the streets.
There were no fatalities; though suffice it to say there were no survivors either. For quarter of a block in all directions there was naught but Crap.
Once that pipe had relieved itself thus, it settled back down to something more akin the "Bog of Eternal Stench", and Ron was able to squirm forward enough to press his face into the still freeflowing Kirby, it being pressed against the bottom inside wall of the pipe. The mask was still quite full, but he was able to suck enough air to stay alive. Topsides, the pipe continued to fart and complain, but most of the pressure differential was removed. Ron struggled out of that pipe, scooting his Kirby along the inside walls, stopping when necessary and moving it over the seams with his teeth.
Spectators topsides pitched in and pulled on the small safety line until Ron wished it would break they were so intent on saving him they nearly pulled off his foot. By the time Ron emerged into daylight the fire department had arrived.
He walked to his dive truck, still in deep sea dress and covered with a four inch layer of stinking .
Women ran, children cried, and grown men wretched. But the fire department saved the day as they broke out the hoses and sprayed down the whole block.
Ron quit that job soon after, and came out West. I hired him and we had many more adventures together, though none as disgusting as that.
