Happy Christmas.
Having rescued several pans of greasy remnants from being swilled down the sink this Christmas, I salute the east London flushers of Thames Water, who have performed a new song of the sewer about the dangers of turkey fat blocking the sewers. It features my old escort Rob Smith, and I should recognise the others, as they’re the East London gang, who took me down the sewers three years ago. London sewers receive 500 tonnes more fat than at other times of year, but at other times of year it’s a hazard too: One sewer staircase I tried to go down was blocked by a huge block of fat. Flushers hate it much, much more than shit, and it costs all sewer companies millions – pounds, dollars, whatever – to clean it up. What should you do with fat? Let it congeal and put it on the garden, or bin it. Bin it, don’t block it.
This BBC story has more, including a typical quote from Rob: “It’s not every day you get to see a rough-and-ready performance of a Christmas carol by a bunch of guys knee deep in poo.”
The words:
London’s sewerman looked out
On their fat-blocked sewers
Fat had fallen round about
Fat from turkey dinners
Fat is flushed both day and night
‘Cos it blocks the sewers
HIther geezer stand by me
Help us to ensure
that the fat goes in the bin
not into the sewer
Then our sewers they will be
Running free and easy
And us London Sewermen
won’t be half as que-e-ezy
Turkey fat and drains don’t mix
Nor do dirty wet wipes
Only what comes out of you
Should go into our pipes
We can take your loo roll too
just to stop it humming
Please be careful what you flush
Down your yuletide plumbing.
Note please – especially the striking employees of London Underground – that the choir of eight men constitutes a quarter of all full-time flusher workers at Thames Water, which at last count had around 40 full-time flushers for 25,000 miles of sewers. You don’t catch them striking for not being paid triple time on Sundays, do you? Thames Water will donate 1p to WaterAid every time this video gets a hit on YouTube.