Date: Mon, 18 Mar 2024 19:36:25 -0400
From: patrick@mudcub.com
Subject: Stinker's Jobs Part 3: Tank Patrol

Stinker's Jobs Part 3: Tank Patrol

by Mudcub

patrick@mudcub.com

***************************************************************

Warning: This story contains a lot of raunch and man sex. If you aren't
interested, consider this to be a warning. This story should only be
interpreted as one man's fantasy, not as a clearance to actually try any
of the unsafe practices here.

***************************************************************

7162 West Hardgrove Street was a run-down set of warehouses in the middle
of nowhere about an hour north of town. Fred's map helped since the cell
phone weren't working out there for GPS.

I went behind a set of buildings and saw Fred's dirty Ford truck, as
well one of the big pumper tank trucks he owned that had "Schmidt
Cleaning" written on the side. "Your number two is our number one
priority!"

Frank was standing a ways away talking to two guys who were in matching
coveralls. I parked my truck and walked over to where they were.

Fred noticed me, "Guys this is Stinker. Stinker, this is Bodie and
Carl," Fred jerked a thumb at the skinny guy on the left, and then the
big guy on the right. Bodie had a really scruffy long black mustache,
like a Fu Manchu. Carl had a huge bushy red beard, like he was Scottish
or something. They were setting up what looked like a rubber kiddie
wading pool, about six feet in diameter, all neon yellow.

Fred turned away, "Follow me and get the rest of the stuff," he yelled
over his shoulder.

The "other stuff" turned out to be a weird set of pipes joined at the
top. Plus a bucket full of rags, and a couple of canvas camping bags that
looked like they had been dunked in muck.

Fred and I dumped all the stuff into a pile, and then he just stood there
waiting for Bodie and Carl to finish whatever they were doing.

"Where is the place we are working?" I asked Fred.

Fred pointed his finger downward to the ground below us.

"Tank," he said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------

So, it turned out that this industrial park was too far away to be fully
on the city sewer system. They had water and gas out here, but all the
sewage was stored in this huge 20,000 concrete septic tank that was
buried in a field right next to the parking lot.

Fred explained the basics to me: the wastewater from the building behind
us flowed using gravity (and a pump, but mostly gravity), into the inlet
of the tank. Then, anaerobic microbes in the tank start eating away at
the sewage -- they love the stuff. This causes a layer of scum to form on
the top of the wastewater. That stuff is harmless, and it (and a bunch of
wastewater), can just flow out of the outlet to a dispersal system.

"See how nice the grass is over there?" Fred pointed to the huge empty
field down a slight hill from where we were standing.

"It is underwater pipes! It is all shit!" Fred said, laughing. The
processed wastewater is full of nutrients that leak out over a huge acre
of land using an underground pipe system. And yeah, I had to admit, the
field DID look pretty lush and green, even if it was basically a swamp of
human shit. Later, I walked over to the "leach field" and noticed that
the grass was kind of spongy. I wondered if I could come back sometime
and find a muddy part of it to roll around in.

While Fred was talking, I noticed Bodie was getting into a huge rubber
hazmat suit. It was orange rubber, or maybe it had been orange at one
time, but now it was so old and used that it was black up almost to the
enclosing hood. It was the first hint I had that Fred was cheap and
didn't like to spend very much on his employees if he didn't have to.

Bodie stripped down to his underwear (black boxer briefs) and a gray
t-shirt. He kept his socks on. Then, Carl held up the rubber suit, and
Bodie wriggled inside. There were attached rubber gloves that had a wide
cuff that looked airtight. Then, Carl screwed on the spacesuit-looking
helmet. It had a big wide visor on the front and a lot scary looking
valves and connectors. One of those connections would supply Bodie with
air while he was in the suit, while another one held a radio wire. That
was the only thing connecting him to the "real world". Through the
visor, I could barely see Brody's face, but it was fogging up already.

Bodie and Carl had been out here for the last few days, Fred explained,
and had used a pump to make sure all the wastewater had been pushed
through the outlet into the leach field. But now the tank hadn't been
fully drained in months, and the stuff left at the bottom of the septic
tank was "sludge" (or "septage").

While the wastewater and the scum on top are safe to spread over the
field, the sludge is not. It's a lot of heavy materials,
non-biodegradable chemicals, plastic, and small rocks and sand. Hearing
this, I had second thoughts on whether I wanted to roll around in it.
Worse, the tank hadn't been pumped in so long that the sludge was almost
reaching the outlet pipes and would soon escape into the leach field.

That's all that was left in the tank: six feet of complete sludge. Muck
that we needed to suck into the pumper truck and drive to a processing
plant. The main sewage treatment plant in town actually paid us to dump
our crap off there. Plus, the industrial complex paid us to haul it away,
so Fred was in essence getting paid twice. It reminded me to ask how much
I was getting paid for this gig.

I looked back at Brody. Not a single inch of his skin was exposed.
That's a good thing, or I'm sure all that shit water would get in. He
was already panting a little from the effort of wearing the suit. Plus,
the sun was now fully up and it was getting warm. I didn't envy Bodie
for his job of being trapped in that full-body suit for this job. I told
Fred as much and he starting laughing.

"Oh, you think being I suit is the hard job?" Fred guffawed. "No, it
is the HANDLERS who have the shit!"

Carl looked up and started laughing, too. I didn't know what was so
funny, but found out quickly.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------

Carl and I were the "handlers". Carl was just part-time and was going
on vacation for a month soon. That's why Fred wanted me along on this
job - he was hoping I'd take over for Carl while he was gone.

The handler makes sure the diver is safe. Because the diver is going to
go down into the tank, and that's dangerous. Remember how I said
there's enough sludge in there to drown in? Plus there are often methane
fumes and other gases that can knock you out. Also there are the usual
industrial accidents -- you can fall all the way eight feet into the
tank, you can stumble, you can knock yourself out. I listened carefully
to all the things that could kill Bodie, and even could kill Carl and me
up on the surface of the earth if we weren't careful.

There's a radio in Bodie's ear, and a little microphone so we can hear
him. Carl tested out the radio, and made sure that air was flowing
through the hose into Bodie's suit. Finally Fred made the call that we
were ready to go in. We all walked over to this manhole near the parking
lot that I hadn't seen before. Carl took a really long three foot
crowbar-looking thing, and motioned for me to go join him. The "manhole
key" had a little hooks that fit over each side of the manhole, so one
would lift and the other side was like a fulcrum. With Carl and me both
pushing down, the manhole popped up sideways.

And man! What a stink came out!

Now, I've been around bathrooms. I've cleaned out culverts and drains
and have picked up roadkill for my park job. But this stink was like
nothing I'd ever smelled before. It was like shit, sure, but also like
old used cooking grease, decaying plants, and pure death. I staggered
backwards, and I could see all three guys laughing at me.

"You gonna be all right?" Carl yelled.

"Um, yup," I lied, and gave a thumbs up. Bodie, is his big clumsy suit,
gave me a thumbs up back. I realized that he could hear us somehow
through a microphone, but of course I couldn't hear him.

Fred and Carl set up a that triangle of pipes I brought over. It was a
tripod about seven feet tall, and the guys set it up directly over the
manhole.

Fred said, "There is ladder, look!" and pointed for me to look. I
peered down into the black hole of the septic tank, but I couldn't see a
ladder. Plus, the reek hit me again the closer I got to the entrance of
the tank.

They put Bodie in a full-body harness, and hooked him up to the winch on
the tripod. His rubber suit had built-in attached rubber boots (I bet to
god they were attached good... I can't imagine all that swill getting in
a filling up a regular pair of boots) but sometimes it was hard to
maneuver the boots on the thin metal stairs going down into the septic
tank. We didn't want Bodie to fall eight feet and die, so the harness
and tripod are good insurance we could lower him down if needed. Plus, I
assumed we'd haul him back out when we were done.

I knew I was pretty useless at performing this new job, so I just stood
back and watched the guys. It took a few minutes to maneuver Bodie into
place under the tripod. Fred touched Bodie's helmet and somehow a light
turned on which lit up whatever was in front of Bodie. Then, they made
sure the winch was working, and Bodie cautiously stepped into the hole on
the first step, holding on the tripod chains which suspended him. Them,
ever so slowly, Bodie stepped down -- then once again, real slowly. Then
again until he was out of sight inside the manhole.

On the radio, Bodie said the sludge was too high for him to hit bottom,
so Fred stopped the winch, and Bodie just hung there like a spaceman in
his helmet, waiting for something to happen.

Carl went and got a huge corrugated hose from the pumper truck. The thing
must have been eight inches across. He fed it down into the manhole where
(I assume) Bodie grabbed the hose. Then Carl went back to the truck and
turned the pump on, making a loud BBBBRRRRRRR.

It was fun to watch at first. Carl pulled on the corrugated hose or
pushed it to give Bodie more slack as needed. I noticed that when a
section of the hose was pulled out of the manhole, it was completely
covered in shit -- a thick coating that dripped off it onto the grass.
Carl would check in every now and then on the headset to make sure Bodie
was all right. Meanwhile, Fred went back to his truck and started the
engine so he could sit in air conditioned comfort.

Carl was sweating pretty heavily, and he motioned me over. It was hard to
hear him over the rumble of the pump truck. He motioned for me to look in
the hole. I approached cautiously, making sure I held onto the metal bars
of the tripod so I wouldn't fall in myself.

Whew! The stink hit me. They say you get used to it after a while, but if
anything, as the day was getting hotter, the fumes coming out of that
manhole made my eyes water. Bodie was lucky, because he was breathing
fresh air pumped in from the truck parked a hundred feet away. But for
Carl and me, we were getting hit right in the face.

I looked into the manhole, and all I could see was brown. Bodie was
complete covered by shit. His rubber paws were holding onto the
corrugated hose, and maneuvering it into the corners to get all the
sludge sucked up. Bu now, the level in the tank was down to three feet or
so, so Bodie was lowered all the way down to the floor. There was just
enough slack in the winch's chains that Bodie could turn around or walk
a few feet away from the ladder.

The corrugated hose was completely covered with shit, and pulling it up
and down got crap all over the outside of the manhole. Carl was wearing
gloves, but it spattered onto his coveralls so it looked like he was
covered head-to-toe too. When I had to lend a hand, I ended up getting in
the "splash zone". I wasn't wearing a uniform, so sewage ended up
going down the back of my work shirt and soaking my pants all the way
through.

The job took HOURS. Carl showed me how to work the radio, so he could
take a smoke break, and left me to look after things to make sure Bodie
was all right.

I switched on the microphone. "You ok, Bodie?" I called into the mic.
Then I instantly shut it off.

"GOD FUCKING DAMMIT" Brodie cursed. "Yeah, yeah.... fuck it all."

I turned on the mic again. "Well, just as long as you were having fun."
And off.

"FUCK YOU STINKER. AND FUCK FRED. AND FUCK CARL. AND FUCK THIS JOB."

The sludge receded to two feet, and then one foot. And then eventually,
all the excess wastewater liquid had been sucked into the pump truck, and
all that was left was shit in the corners of the concrete tank. This was
the trickiest part of the cleaning, so Carl took over the radio job, and
got out another hose.

This hose had pressurized water from a small pony tank on the bank of the
pump truck. So there were three hoses going down in the hole to Bodie:
the corrugated sucker, pressurized air, and now a jet of water that Bodie
could squirt around. To do this, Carl let out the maximum of chain from
the winch, so now Carl could walk around a little bit on the concrete
floor of the tank. Or at least anything within a circle five or six feet
or so from the ladder.

I think the smell of the sewage had gone down, but by now I couldn't
really smell anything but shit. I knelt closer to the manhole and shined
a flashlight inside. The tank looked like a basement room made of
concrete blocks, about twenty feet by twenty feet and eight feet tall.
Bodie was working in one of the corners, spraying the high pressure water
into the mass of sludge piled high again the far wall, turning in into
liquid. Then, he was sucking the mess up as fast as he could as the mass
leaked all over the floor again.

For the smaller stuff, I got Bodie a broom from the truck, and he swept
the corners clean, and then repeated the water-and-sucking. After five
full hours of work, you'd never know the dark wet room ever held
anything. Well, except for the odor -- that seemed to last forever even
when all the shit was gone.

Bodie came up to the ladder and he and Carl had a long discussion I
didn't hear. Carl gave Bodie some kind of camera -- it was bulky and was
in a case so it looked like it wouldn't get damaged if you dropped it.
Somehow, Bodie could work the controls even through his gloves, and he
disappeared down away from the manhole for another half hour.

Carl explained that Bodie had to take video of every single inch of the
concrete tank. Then, there was an engineering firm Fred contracted out
with that would look at the footage and try to find cracks or problems.
The tank would remain empty for a week or more, and the contractor would
send out one of their own engineers to verify that the septic tank was
safe and could be refilled again.

The sun was starting to go down at about 3 pm when Bodie radioed that he
was done. "Now our fun starts," Carl said to me.

Bodie got directly under the manhole and the tripod, and Carl started the
winch slowly. Though it looked like Bodie didn't need much help -- he
was physically fit enough to pull himself up the ladder, even with the
big rubber suit on.

It was kind of funny to look at: Bodie popped his head through the
manhole and looked like some kind of shit monster being born. Sewage
dripped from his helmet, and I could see the front of the visor was
smeared with brown filth like Bodie had wiped it off so he could see.
Bodie got his shoulders through the manhole, and pressed up his torso and
got one knee up on the ground.

Here's where Carl and me came in. We came in on either side of Bodie and
helped him stand up. This was a dangerous part of the event, because
Bodie could slip and fall all the way back down the manhole. Or Carl and
I could fall -- or all three of us. It was kind of a ballet to prop up
Bodie, while Carl detached the harness Bodie was wearing, and allowed him
to step away to safety.

Holding up Bodie meant the whole side of my body was soaked in filth. My
hands slipped in the shit on Bodie's suit as I tried to hold him up. To
tell the truth, I didn't really know what I was doing. But Carl and
Bodie did, and soon we half-walked half-dragged Bodie over to that kiddie
pool they had set up earlier.

Bodie dripped a constant stream of muck as he got there -- he made a
brown path in the grass from the manhole to the wading pool. Great globs
of crap fell off his body, and he walked like a giant penguin, waddling
from side to side, hold his arms away from his body. He trailed all the
cables and hoses behind him.

I gathered up the corrugated hose and the air hose, and just coiling the
stiff rubber splashed more sewage all over my head and shoulders. I was
wearing gloves, but they were just leather, so soon they were cold and
slimy and weren't much better than wearing nothing at all. Carl took the
pressurized water and sprayed Bodie's visor so he could see. Then, he
meticulously went down, top to bottom, spraying the brown-gray muck off
Bodie and letting it pool in the rubber beneath Bodie.

Carl had me step into the pool with him, and this soaked my boots like I
just stepped into a puddle. Carl unlatched the helmet from the rest of
Bodie's drysuit, and I set the head piece over on the grass a ways away.
Then Carl unzipped the back of the suit. And Bodie's arm and shoulder
came free from the suit.

"Whoo-wee!" Bodie yelled as the rubber suit fell to his waist. "Damn,
I never get used to that stink!"

I realized that Bodie hadn't been smelling the brown water until now. I
guess that was one of the nice parts of being the diver was that Bodie
was pretty much isolated from the nasty stuff, even as he was working
knee-deep in it. The scrubbing and cleaning was left up to the handlers.

And there was a LOT of cleaning left to do -- several hours worth. I
stretched the hoses out on the grass, so Carl could spray them down to
clean them. We sprayed the outside AND inside of Bodie's rubber suit
with water. I got a sniff of the inside of the suit, and it reeked of
sweat and rubber. And sewage, everything stunk of that same mix of odors.

Carl sucked up all the "water" that was in the kiddie pool and then
rinsed in out. Bodie's suit was laid out to dry, the hoses rolled and
put back in place on the truck, and I folded up the tripod and put it
back in Fred's truck. The whole time Fred didn't get out to help. That
must be the nice part of being a supervisor!

I was soaked with shit from head to toe. Or maybe it was sweat -- was
sweating like a pig in the afternoon heat. I noticed that Bodie was still
just wearing his t-shirt and it was dripping with sweat. Inside the
rubber suit, it was all he could do to stay hydrated. He was guzzling
Gatorade by the truck, and looked pretty wiped out.

Carl put a mesh cage over the manhole so we could leave it open without
anything falling it. He said that helped air it out for the inspection
late tin the week. I asked what the industrial park did with the septic
tank out of commission, and Carl told me there was actually ANOTHER
septic tank on the other side of the parking lot that was still in use.
So, when this one passed inspection, they would shut that one down so
maintenance could be done.

And guess who had to come back later that month and help clean the second
tank?