Beaches close in Palm Beach County: Why are warnings late and where's this bacteria coming from?

[bronxiteforever]

By Kimberly Miller
Palm Beach Post
Posted at 3:52 PM
Updated at 3:58 PM

Another round of beaches closed Wednesday because of harmful bacteria levels. Unfortunately, the ‘no-swimming’ warnings you get are usually too late. Also, as of now it’s almost impossible to find out where the bacteria is coming from.

On Wednesday, another round of Palm Beach County beaches were closed because of harmful bacteria levels that were in some cases nearly three times higher than what is needed for an advisory. The closures mark 14 times this year advisories were issued at county beaches. In all of 2018, 15 advisories were issued.

...a lack of water circulation and heavy runoff are likely key reasons for enterococcus advisories. That could be why the Gulf Coast suffers more advisory days with runoff from rivers such as the Hillsborough into Tampa Bay, the Peace River into Charlotte Harbor and the Caloosahatchee River into San Carlos Bay.

“The biggest thing I would think is the flushing,” said Sullivan, noting that testing for enterococci is a laborious process that can take two days. “An E. coli detector is the holy grail of technology.”

https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/20190814/beaches-close-in-palm-beach-county-why-are-warnings-late-and-wherersquos-this-bacteria-coming-from

[TheRealNorth]

1. Limits to environmental water testing

I did beach water testing for a public health department when I first got out of college, and the most reliable tests available was (and I believe still is) based on culturing (growing) microbes from a water sample. It takes about 18-24 hours to culture a sample, so once you include the time it takes to collect and deliver the sample to the lab, it's the next day when you have the results.

You also have to consider that they may not collect water samples every day (where I was, it was 2-3 times a week)

They have been looking at quantitative PCR methods that could be done faster (4-5 hours) for the past 15 years,, but to my knowledge, the methods that have been published so far have not proven to be as reliable.

[Callmecrazy]

2. We've had a lot of rain here lately. A lot...

When we get flooding, we get spillover from the treatment plants. Can't fight Mother Nature. Give it a day and it's all washed away. Small price to pay to live in paradise.