Questions surround what led to discovery of human remains at Corpus Christi lift station

The investigation of what led to the discovery of human remains at a Corpus Christi wastewater collection point on Monday night is ongoing, leading to questions about the facility’s scope of operations as additional details become available.

Corpus Christi Police Department and Corpus Christi Fire Department officials were at the site for most of the afternoon and into the evening hours of June 24, with additional personnel and equipment called to assist in retrieving the human remains from the 40-foot-deep wet well, police said.

The wastewater collection point, located in the center of a field near Holly Road between Ennis Joslin and Lexington Roads in the Oso Sewershed, is part of the City of Corpus Christi’s municipal Sewer Collection System, which includes more than 1,282 miles of gravity mains interwoven with about 100 lift stations, according to information on the City’s Wastewater Service Area website.

The lift station is designed to convey wastewater to treatment facilities through a system of pipes and pump stations, which is treated according to federal and state standards.

As the name implies, it operates by pumping, or lifting, wastewater to a higher point from low areas of land from pipes that lie deeply underground, allowing the water to flow by gravity, or to be pumped under pressure to a treatment plant.

A Corpus Christi wastewater facility manager oversees dedicated crews responsible for operation and maintenance of lift stations, including response to failures resulting from power outages, mechanical issues, lift station control failures, pump blockages, vandalism and damage from severe storms, according to a Lift Station Response Plan document.

City crews routinely visit each lift station—many on a daily basis, and others several times a week--with a team of electricians and mechanical repair staff responding or troubleshooting any identified failures and performing remedial measures necessary to resolve failure events. Additional staff are engaged on an as-needed basis, the document said.

For every lift station, the City monitors four basic events, including main power failures, control power failures, high water levels in the well and water detection in drywells.

City wastewater staff are responsible for maintaining, repairing and rehabilitating wastewater collection facilities that are located on public property, responding to an estimated 17,000 customer service calls, installing 780 cleanouts and repairs, replacing and rehabilitating about 220 manholes and cleaning out 1.1 million feet of wastewater mains, the website said.

CCFD did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday on the logistical details of the well site that might point to what led to the discovery of human remains there.

Corpus Christi Water issued a public comment, stating that CCPD has an active investigation involving an issue that includes information about the CCW wastewater services, but that no additional information was available, and that anyone with questions should visit the website at Wastewater | City of Corpus Christi (cctexas.com).

This investigation is ongoing.

More: Human remains found at wastewater collection point in Corpus Christi Monday afternoon

This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Questions surround what led to discovery of human remains at Corpus Christi lift station