What on earth have you been flushing down your toilet? For the first time ever the Department of Environmental Protection is cleaning out the city's 136 miles of sewers, and superintendent of sewer operations Chris Laudando said, "You're surprised every day as to what comes out of there. You see bricks. You see cans, bottles, grease, hairballs." All of which causes sewage to flood the waterways during storms. more ›

The building where the UN Security Council and the General Assembly were scheduled to meet today was evacuated due to a "suspicious odor." UN officials initially said the smell was caused by a gas leak in the basement, but wire reports say "it's a sewer line." At least it's not bedbugs this time! The meeting is currently being moved to the North Lawn building. more ›

The sewer gator spotted in Astoria over the weekend is really an 18-inch long caiman (Caiman crocodilus), and was only found near a sewer drain. After being taken in by Animal Care & Control, the one-year-old reptile will be brought to an animal sanctuary in the Poconos. (He's going to love those champagne glass baths!) According to the NY Post, yesterday he was being kept under a 100-watt heat lamp in Brooklyn, where an ACC director theorized on how he could have ended up in Queens. more ›

If you've ever shrugged off the idea of gators in our sewers before, you might be interested in hearing about this alligator that was just pulled from the sewer system in Queens. Yes, the legend is real. more ›

A little kitten hailing from the Bronx found itself in the city's sewer system recently. According to the Daily News, 21-year-old Edita Pjetrovic couldn't find her kitten named Motz, and says he likely slipped out the door during a barbecue she was having on Sunday. During her search, a friend at a local pizza shop told her a cat was heard meowing near Morris Park Avenue and White Plains Road—the noise was coming from under a sewer grate. The Department of Environmental Protection to the rescue! Workers helped locate and rescue the cat on Wednesday using video cameras, and Pjetrovic told the paper, "They really helped. They were really kind." Last summer a New Jersey kitten was rescued from the sewers—maybe they're trying to become the sewer gators. more ›

A pair of tiny southeastern Queens neighborhoods have finally been linked to the city's sewer system, meaning the water that goes down residents' drains will no longer be dumped directly into a creek that terminates in Jamaica Bay. "When I first moved here, they told me, 'You're all getting sewers soon,'" said Lenny Zamiello, 88, a retired carpet and linoleum installer. "That was 60 years ago." more ›

Did you know that today marks the 75th anniversary of the birth of one of New York's greatest urban legends? Yep, the discovery of alligators in the NYC sewer system! Back in November we took a look back at the city's history with alligators, dating back to at least 1935 when the New York Times reported on an 8-footer in East Harlem! more ›

It's the question that's baffled every four-year-old in America. Where does the water go when you flush the toilet? Now, thanks to this map from the environmental health organization Habitat Map, you can find out the answer. The map breaks down the city into color-coded "sewagesheds," allowing New Yorkers can figure out if their toilets contribute to the stench that has long plagued sections of Brooklyn near the Owls Head Wastewater Treatment Plant, or if heavy rains cause their flushes to become a part of the 586 million gallons of raw sewage poured into Newtown Creek annually, or the 1.43 billion gallons dumped into the waters off of Astoria every year. It's also the perfect complement to this map of New York City public toilets. more ›

In 1935, the NY Times published an article titled, “Alligator Found in Uptown Sewer,” tracing the actions of 16-year-old Salvatore Condoluci and his comrades, who trapped and killed an 8-foot-long alligator found under 123rd Street. Today, at 92, Condoluci still remembers some of the tale, and the Times looks back at the urban legend. more ›

To paraphrase Mel Brooks, "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when a Staten Island teen falls down an open manhole while text-messaging." 15-year-old Alexa Longueira was walking with a friend around 5 p.m. yesterday and was about to send a text when she felt the ground give way: "She literally just handed me the phone and I opened it [and] I felt this big drop. It was four or five feet, it was very painful. I kind of crawled out and the DEP guys came running and helped me. ... They were just, like, 'I'm sorry! I'm sorry!'" Longueira got some scrapes on her arms and back (pictured), but doctors are concerned about possible spine damage and want a follow-up MRI. A DEP spokesperson says workers left the manhole momentarily to retrieve cones from the truck and expressed "regret." But Alexa's mother is determined to sue the city, and argues that it doesn't matter whether Alexa was texting or not; the manhole shouldn't have been left open. She tells the Staten Island Advance that even though the sewer wasn't full, "Oh my God, it was putrid. One of her sneakers is still down there." more ›

It was, oh, about one year ago that fisherman Robert Skonieczny first caught wind of an awful stench coming in the direction of Tottenville on Staten Island. Courageously, Skonieczny tracked the odors along Arthur Kill to its source: a storm drain spewing feces and other human waste into a marsh that feeds the bay! A call to 311 was placed, and he was told an investigator would be dispatched to the area. But over time, the smell got worse, the water in the marina got murkier, and the storm drain continued spewing feces, feminine hygiene products and toilet paper. Until yesterday! The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) was on the scene and finally fixed an obstructed sanitary sewer that was diverting the waste to the storm sewers. DEP says they never received a complaint until this Monday, and suggested maybe Skonieczny's complaint got sent to the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), but that city agency tells the Staten Island Advance they weren't alerted until last Friday. In other sewage news, be advised this is not the weekend for a dip in the Hudson; some 2 million gallons of raw sewage could be dumped in the river Sunday while a pipeline is repaired in Yonkers. more ›

Three "blockheaded" teenagers, as the Daily News puts it, were enjoying a good old fashioned romp in the sewage system yesterday when they got confused and lost their way. 16-year-old Schiller Milfort and 17-year-old Marvin Ottley were joined by an unidentified 15-year-old boy during the misadventure in Queens. An NYPD source mused, "These three idiots were playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and wanted to go into the sewers." The News reports that the trio were finally rescued unharmed from a sewer in Kissena Park, sans shirts or shells, and Milfort and Ottley were charged with trespassing. more ›

Yesterday morning's rain caused a recently installed sewer main to burst, flooding the basement and parking garage of a Battery Park City luxury apartment building. Water levels reached up to 20 feet. Not only were car owners greeted with news that their vehicles were either submerged or floating on top of sewer water, hundreds of tenants at 90 West Street were evacuated. Fire officials explained that, per WNBC, "rain flooded a re-routed sewer pipe,... more ›