Bacteria Strikes O.C. Surf Again

Orange County health officials indefinitely closed nearly half a mile of Huntington State Beach’s shore Tuesday after finding frequent, puzzling spikes in bacteria levels.

The cause remains unknown, though state and county officials suspect beach bathrooms may be leaking human waste into the surf. Officials could not say how long the beach will be closed but warned it will be longer than the closures commonly caused by sewage spills.

Signs warning of the closure were posted on the beach early Tuesday. State park officials said the beach has few visitors now, between spring break and Memorial Day weekend.

The closure--2,000 feet around Magnolia Street--is reminiscent of the summer of 1999, when health officials closed miles of Huntington Beach for two months. The origin of that bacterial contamination has never been determined, though many theories have been put forward and several agencies have spent millions of dollars studying it.

Last week, a study by UC Irvine and Scripps Institution of Oceanography showed that it is possible for a plume of partly treated sewage that is released more than four miles off Huntington Beach to be pushed back into the surf zone by underwater currents and the tide.

Tuesday’s closure is the first time since 1999 that health authorities have closed a beach without knowing of an actual sewage spill. But the centralized location of the high bacteria counts and the ratio of the various types of bacteria indicate that it’s probably a local source rather than something like the sewage plume, said Monica Mazur, spokeswoman for the Orange County Health Care Agency.

State and local officials met Monday and noticed that increasingly frequent bacteria spikes were occurring around Magnolia Street as more people were frequenting the beach, which would increase traffic at the two sets of bathrooms and the lifeguard headquarters there.

Don Ito, Orange County’s state parks superintendent, said the restrooms have all been put out of service.

A contractor will arrive today to start testing the pipes, said Ito, who hopes to have the situation remedied before Memorial Day. But Ito conceded that there is some uncertainty.

“We don’t know what’s going on, actually,” he said.

Mazur said she doesn’t know when the beach will be reopened, but expects it to be longer than a couple of days, the typical length of time after a sewage spill.

Swimming in sewage-tainted water can cause such gastrointestinal problems as nausea, vomiting and diarrhea; eye, ear, nose and throat infections; and viral diseases such as hepatitis.

Shirley S. Dettloff, a Huntington Beach city councilwoman and a state coastal commissioner, hoped for a quick resolution.

“I hope we can get to the source real fast,” she said.

“Hopefully, this is something that is not a part of the great mystery” of 1999.