On the morning of Sept. 5, it was found that a sewage pipe in the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity house connected to the main sewer was plugged and backing up, causing water to leak onto the floor of Lambda’s basement, affecting their laundry room and kitchen.

The problem has since been resolved. Smith’s Sewer Service came on site on a special call, it being Labor Day, and found that many wet wipes were plugging the sewer line. It is advised not to flush those, as they are not to go in the sewer line.

“We’ll make sure to go back and do a second cleaning to make sure it’s good,” Matt Hansen, Dean of Students and Director of Residence Life, said. “Because that’s not the substance you want in your living quarters.”

Hansen received a call from Brian Schultes of Jones, Lang and LaSalle (JLL), the on-site campus services, shortly after 11 a.m. to inform him about the sewer issues. In response, an email was sent out to residents of Lambda at 11:13 a.m. telling them about the emergency work and asking them, “PLEASE DO NOT flush your toilets in Lambda until the work is complete.” They also contacted the Community Advisor (CA) to spread the word.

“There’s been a lot of problems before in terms of sewage that we have in this house,” Scott Kreuger, President of Lambda, said. “Last year, we had a similar issue, although this one seems to be much worse.”

Providing aid, Kappa Theta Psi (KOY) allowed Lambda members to use their facilities as needed while the work was being done.

“It’s inconvenient to not have any water usage,” Bodhi Mains, head of recruitment for Lambda, said. “Whether it’s doing laundry or showering or bathrooms. But luckily, KOY has been generous in offering their bathrooms or showers to us.”

“I will say that Simpson was pretty responsive in terms of getting someone out here to help yesterday,” Kreuger said. “We just really hope that there can be some renovations to our sewage system because we know that the water system for all the fraternity row houses is not the best.”