Pete Osborne

The call came just after half nine in the morning. Emergency at a restaurant in town. Burst pipe in the basement, toilets out of order, flooding. I didn’t think much of it—I’ve been a plumber for over fifteen years, seen more than my fair share of leaks and messes. But this… this one was different.

By the time I got there, twenty minutes later, the owner looked like he’d seen a ghost. “It’s bad,” he said, leading me down. He wasn’t exaggerating. The basement was knee-deep in water, brown, murky, with bits floating in it I won’t describe. The smell hit me like a punch in the face. I’ve been around sewage before, but this was something else—raw, thick, unbearable. Worse still, it wasn’t just clean water. There was backflow from the main sewer. Human waste everywhere. Floating, clinging to walls, the stairs, even the underside of tables.

First thing was stopping the flow. Took me ten minutes to find the shutoff valve, hidden behind some shelving and half-submerged. Then came the real work: pumping the water out, clearing the filth, finding the exact location of the burst, and replacing the damaged section. It was a long, grim job. We wore suits and masks, but it still soaked through.

I’m 38 now, living in Manchester, UK, and you’d think I’d be used to this. But standing in that basement, wading through other people’s filth, I thought: Why the hell am I still doing this?

The pipes were completely corroded—like brittle bones, crumbling in my hands. I told the owner he’d need a full replacement, not just a patch job. He looked hollow, said he hadn’t paid his insurance in months. “Don’t know if they’ll cover any of it,” he mumbled. I nodded, but inside I thought, You’re screwed, mate.

I showered twice that night, scrubbed until my skin felt raw, but when I finally lay down in bed, it was still there—that smell. Not in the air, maybe, but in my memory. Days like that, I curse this job.