iPod in toilet causes blockage

By Allison Sundaram

If you're missing an iPod, facilities may want to talk with you.

Facility workers spent over $1,000 and a week's worth of labor removing a pink iPod mini from the sewer system underneath the College of Arts and Sciences building last week.

The building had been having plumbing problems for several months before the iPod was discovered, with facilities receiving four or five calls a week to unclog bathroom fixtures in the building's downstairs bathrooms.

An independent contractor, which had been called in several times to unclog the toilets and floor drains, had found and corrected some imperfections with the plumbing; however, the problems had continued.

According to Eugene Bowers, the lead mechanic for maintenance and facilities who oversaw the operation, the problem finally became so bad that another contractor was called in to feed a camera on a cable into the pipe to find the source of the blockage.

"About three feet into the turn to one of the branch lines to the main, there was a pink iPod," Bowers said.

But finding the iPod was only half the battle. "Trying to retrieve the iPod became another challenge: Even though it was such a short distance from the toilet, we couldn't reach it," Bowers said.

The almost four-inch-long iPod was located in a four-inch pipe, wedged in a position where it could neither turn on its side nor be dislodged. Workers used a cable with an attachment for grabbing items in an attempt to pull the iPod out of the pipe.

When the iPod proved unreachable, they tried to break the device apart with a cutter attachment so that the pieces could disperse into the sewer system.

The cutter grabbed the iPod, making a dent in the case. However, the cutter then broke off.

"It was indestructible," Bowers said.

The iPod was eventually pushed 20 feet further into the pipe, where it could no longer be reached. It came to rest underneath the office of the dean of arts and sciences.

"Worst case scenario was jackhammering the cement floor to get the pipe open," Bowers said.

The crew avoided catastrophe by flushing many toilets and running sinks simultaneously to create a blast of water, which moved the iPod into a larger, main pipe.

The following day, a hydrojet company was called in to blast a jet of water down the pipe in order to move the iPod out. It worked, but its side effect was a build-up of air and water pressure that caused geysers to burst from the second floor toilets.

Bowers was able to retrieve the iPod from a sewage disposal point outside of the building by sharpening a piece of rebar and sticking it in the iPod screen.

The iPod is no longer in working condition. The screen was damaged while removing it from the pipe. The case was dented and scratched by the work done in the pipe, and the control panel was ripped away.

Bowers has contacted the Apple outlet at Valley Fair about finding the owner.

"All I need is a name, so I can have Campus Safety track them down," Bowers said.

Contact Allison Sundaram at (408) 554-4546 or asundaram@scu.edu.