Newton prison sewer pipe breaks, no danger found to fish

A broken sewer pipe in central Iowa was repaired this morning after a weekend mishap spewed many thousand gallons of raw sewage. The state D-N-R says it appears there’s NO significant environmental damage from the weekend bursting of a sewer pipe between the state prison in Newton and a waste-water treatment plant. Some 80-thousand gallons of sewage leaked into a tributary of the South Skunk River. Water levels in the river are high thanks to the recent snowmelt, allowing the sewage to be quickly diluted. No fishkill is reported.