County checking into foul odor

Jenny Marder

County health officials are trying to pinpoint the cause of a

mysterious smell from the Talbert Channel that has been wafting

through the surrounding neighborhood for the past three weeks.

Scientists installed 24-hour monitoring equipment in the Talbert

Channel last week to keep a watch on the water to determine the

odor’s source and put an end to it, said Richard Boon, supervisor of

the storm water section of the county’s public facilities resources

department.

By next week, county officials hope to begin fixing the problem.

“The most likely candidate will be to arrange a flush-through of

the channel to remove stagnant water,” Boon said, adding that county

health officials are working with scientists at UC Irvine to

determine the best way to do this.

The smell has been a source of worry and confusion for nearby

residents, who fear that it is the cause of splitting headaches and

the death of hundreds of fish.

“I’d like to know why all of a sudden it would happen when it

never happened before,” said Brian Visnoski, a Southeast Huntington

Beach resident who studies marine biology as a hobby.

It was Visnoski who first reported the strong chemical odor and

the death of many fish to the Department of Fish and Game three weeks

ago. During the first week, the smell changed from a chemical odor to

a sulfuric, rotten egg smell and then, for a short period,

disappeared altogether, Visnoski said. But now it’s back in full

force.

Water-quality tests have indicated that the odor is a result of a

combination of natural processes rather than toxic dumping, Boon

said.

“We believe it to be a natural condition as opposed to a

pollution-induced condition,” Boon said. “What we believe we have is

the product of natural decay processes in a body of stagnant water.”

Boon suspects it to be a convergence of several things: the influx

of red tide from the ocean and a prolonged period of extremely low

tides, compounded by a flow of water through the channel that has

slowed since the Talbert Marsh was restored as a natural treatment

system.

“The oxygen drops because of increased organic loads, which leads

to the stirring up of channels muds and the liberation of foul

smelling gases like ammonia and hydrogen sulfide,” Boon said.

Some residents are skeptical.

“It’s gotten worse again,” Southeast Huntington Beach resident

John Scott said. “Last week, we had several days of reprieve and had

hoped it had gone away ... . Then, on Monday, I woke up and the odor

was bad. It seems to be getting worse rather than better.”

Residents continue to complain about headaches, sore throats and

other flu-like symptoms that they fear are a result of airborne

chemicals from the water.

“My wife has complained now for two days about headaches, and

she’s attributing it to the channel,” Scott said.

Boon said that air-quality monitoring last week showed no

contaminants present in the air at a level that would present a

significant health effects, Boon said.

But residents say that their concerns won’t subside until

scientists pinpoint the true source of the smell.

“It’s ominous,” Scott said. “We just don’t know what’s causing it

and if we don’t know that, we don’t know what effect it’s having on

us.”

* JENNY MARDER covers City Hall. She can be reached at (714)

965-7173 or by e-mail at [email protected].