COLUMBIA, S.C. — Residents aiming to soak up some sun at a Columbia-area river should be careful what part they enjoy on Thursday.
Columbia Water shared a swimming advisory announcement just after 12 p.m. warning swimmers to avoid the area of the Saluda River from the Saluda Shoals canoe landing to I-20. The announcement is in response to high bacteria levels found in a Wednesday sample in the area.
The latest sample found 648 bacteria per 100 milliliters of water. An advisory stage starts when there are more than 349 bacteria per 100 milliliters of water. A chart on the Midlands Rivers Coalition monitoring website shows Wednesday’s measurement to be the highest at that particular sample site in at least a year and the first to reach an advisory stage in that amount of time.
Samples are taken weekly from May to September through the warmest months and are resampled on Thursday if an area has been found to have a high bacteria level. However, officials suggest these samples are only snapshots of that particular moment.
While the advisories do suggest that the water may contain harmful germs and bacteria such as E. Coli, they don’t prevent residents from using the river when there are high bacteria levels.