LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A sewer line busted last month in Prospect, spilling more than a million gallons of sewage, and the entire site is about to flood before crews can finish fixing anything.

The problem is Ohio River is rising, faster and higher than expected. Recent rain has changed the projections of the National Weather Service, so the river and Harrods Creek are rising two inches per hour.

"They're working diligently now to do as much as they can," said Sheryl Lauder, communications program manager for MSD. "I guess the saying goes when it rains it pours. Well, it really poured."

The 30 inch pipe that broke runs 35 feet below Harrods Creek, right behind a neighborhood on Harrods Run Road and Timber Creek Court. Contractors are in the middle of building a protective metal box so that they can safely reach the pipe to repair it. 

But all of that is on hold now.

"We thought it would be like a foot above pool. It now it's projected to be at 21 feet, when it normally pools at 12," Lauder said. "We've got a little more on our plate than we expected ... but we've got a plan to get through it."

For now, MSD crews are going to bring the equipment up to higher ground and secure what they've built so nothing else gets damaged.

"There'll be a pump station, a temporary pull station installed right around that area," Lauder said. "That will keep the sewer water inside the sewer system."

It's still not clear what caused the sewer line to bust in the first place, but all the more frustrating is the relative young age of it.

"That's the bad part," Lauder said. "This sewer line was only put in seven years ago. So to have a failure of this magnitude with that age pipe is really unusual."

MSD was planning to work through next week, but crews will have to wait and see once the water recedes.

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