MANATEE COUNTY, Fla. — Engineering crews continue to work on a potential gypsum stack collapse and leak in the Piney Point area of Manatee County.

The situation has escalated since Friday with a State of Emergency for Manatee County being declared today by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

On-site engineers felt they situation worsened Saturday morning and suggested more evacuations.

9:50 P.M. UPDATE: Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Saturday night that he would be traveling to Manatee County Sunday to speak with local officials about the potential gypsum stack collapse and leak in Piney Point.

He urged residents to follow evacuation orders in the areas affected by the ongoing leak.

DeSantis is expected to give an update on the leak at 11 a.m. Sunday from the Manatee County Emergency Center.

In a Saturday night release from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Secretary Noah Valenstein said workers are trying to make sure any releases from the pond are "controlled and stopped as quickly as possible."

"We are completing rigorous water quality sampling daily to support any future enforcement action," Valenstein said in the release. "While this water meets most water quality standards for marine waters, there are elevated levels of nutrients and the water is acidic. However, the water is not radioactive."

6:21 P.M. UPDATE: More homes have been added to those already under an evacuation order in the area of the Piney Point leak. U.S. 41 has been closed from Buckeye Road to Moccasin Wallow Road.

A total of 316 households are included in the evacuation order.

5:45 P.M. UPDATE: Gov. Ron DeSantis issued an executive order Saturday in response to the leak at Piney Point, calling the prospect of system failure at the Eastport Terminal Facility a "disaster and environmental emergency."

As a result, he extended a state of emergency declaration currently in effect in Manatee County, to Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.

In the event of a catastrophic failure, DeSantis ordered every county in the state to prepare for a possible influx of evacuees.

"I direct each of the counties named in Section 1 of this Executive Order to activate its County Emergency Management plan to ensure an immediate state or operational readiness, and I further direct the remaining counties in the State of Florida, at the discretion of the State Coordinating Officer, to prepare to activate all shelters to accommodate the evacuees," the executive order said.

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At a news conference Saturday afternoon with county and environmental officials, the acting Manatee County administrator Dr. Scott Hopes said right now the flow of the leaked water is going in the controlled direction.

There currently is not a full breach.

“Plans and policies are in place and ready to be implemented to ensure the facility is safe for everyone,” Hopes said.

Piney Point contains three ponds on site and Hopes said there’s 800 million gallons of toxic water on site.

Crews are trying to control where the flow goes.

Sen. Rick Scott announced on Twitter Saturday that he is currently monitoring the situation at Piney Point and will work to make federal resources available if needed. 

About 10-15 homes have been evacuated, all in about a mile radius from the plant. The concern remains that reservoir could collapse, causing a flood of wastewater in this area.

Manatee County is working with plant and environmental officials to dump some of the wastewater.

They are pumping about 22,000 gallons a minute. Additional equipment and pumps will be brought in with the emergency declaration. 

The whole process could take about 10 to 12 days but that’s a moving target, according to county officials.

Hopes did say all residents in the mostly agricultural area are evacuated and safe and none have requested any aid.

A complete evacuation of the Piney Point reservoir site and surrounding area has been ordered. 

Manatee County officials said the evacuation is due to a further collapse of a phosphogypsum stack. The collapse occurred despite overnight efforts from state and local crews to reinforce the breached areas.

People within a half-mile radius received an emergency notification to evacuate at 11:01 a.m. 

Also, FHP Troopers from Manatee and Hillsborough Counties will close US-41. Currently, US-41 is closed at 113th Street East in Manatee County and now at College Avenue in Hillsborough County. 

9:20 P.M. UPDATE: Manatee County officials held a news conference Friday night to share the latest information on the efforts to contain this developing situation.

The county's new administrator, Dr. Scott Hopes, who has been on the job for two days, said it could take 10-12 days to completely alleviate the risk of a complete collapse of the retention ponds. But he called that timeline a "moving target" based on the current rate of 22,000 gallons per minute being pumped from the pond into Port Manatee.

“We are using a piping system that was used when we dredged out the port, and we are reversing the flow,” he said.

Hopes explained that there are a number of small breaches in addition to a significant leak at the bottom of the retention pond.

“We’re not talking about anything with radiation or high levels of heavy metals,” he explained. “The other two pools contain additional solutions."

The area around Piney Point is mostly industrial and sparsley populated. Officials say about 10-15 homes have been evacuated.

8:00 P.M. UPDATE: The evacuation order has been extended to include all homes and businesses one mile north of Piney Point phosphogypsoum stack.

6:10 P.M. UPDATE: An emergency alert was sent Friday afternoon that said:

"Evacuation of area due to imminent uncontrolled release of wastewater at Buckeye Road and Bud Rohden Road. Area of concern is south of Buckeye Road, from U.S. 41 to O'Neil Road.

"Make plans to evacuate immediately from the area. Effected individuals can call 311 for information."

ORIGINAL STORY:

MANATEE COUNTY, Fla. — A small leak at a wastewater containment pond near Port Manatee is threatening to dump a million gallons of phosphate byproduct-polluted water into Tampa Bay.

This is the second leak at the old phosphate facility that shut down in 2003 after the company that owned it, Mulberry Corp., went bankrupt.

"I am heavily focused on maintaining just stack stability, and knowing, I'm worried about the next hour, not necessarily focused on what is a month down the road," said Jeff Barath with HRK Holdings, the company in charge of the site.

On Friday, crews are working to siphon off millions of gallons of wastewater from the old gypsum stack that is leaking.

It is one of several ponds that is used to filter phosphate bi-products over several years’ time.

HRK Holdings is diverting water to relieve pressure from the pond into a 28-acre backup pond.

Under all of the gypsum stacks at the former Piney Point facility is a system of thousands of feet of seams, constructed to seal pollutants from seeping out.  

The seams under more than 70 acres of ponds at the site are now 18 years old.

Since last week when the leak was discovered, only trace amounts of polluted water have escaped the ponds, posing no health or safety risks.

Manatee County, although not in charge of the site, is closely monitoring the emergency work to drain polluted water out of the pond, and fix the leak.

"We are following what corrective measures are available to us," said Charles Hunsinger with Manatee County Parks and Natural Resources.  "There is nothing there that we don't know what to do, and we are trying to move as much water off the property, of that particular pond, so the pressure is not there to increase the width of the seam"

Back in 2003, Florida's Department of Environmental Protection got approval to dump millions of gallons of treated wastewater from Piney Point miles out in the gulf.

The effort was to alleviate the pond's potential to overflow or cause leaks when the site closed.

Then in 2011, heavy rains caused problems at the site again.

The current leak at the old Piney Point site threatens to cause algae blooms and wide-scale fish kill in Tampa Bay should the wastewater, with a high concentration of nitrogen and phosphate bi-products, rush into Tampa Bay.