During the night of Friday to Saturday, a malfunctioning valve at the Beggen wastewater treatment plant caused a large amount of waste to be released into the waters of the Alzette river.
Simone Beissel, head of wastewater and wastewater treatment plants at the City of Luxembourg, confirmed this in an interview with RTL.
The environmental impact has been dramatic: hundreds of fish have died following the contamination. RTL reader Wendy Winn said a number of fish were seen floating in the water and an unpleasant smell permeated the area. A team of experts visited the site on Saturday night to gauge the situation.
The mayor of Walferdange, who was informed of the issue by local fire fighters on Saturday evening, has launched an investigation into the extent of the pollution, as well as solutions to normalise the situation as soon as possible.
