SAN DIEGO — Chula Vista resident and Imperial Beach lifeguard Lillian Burkhart still remembers the sting on her skin after surfing in Imperial Beach waters one day last summer. Within 24 hours, she fell ill with a gastrointestinal infection, she said.
"As the day went on after I left the water, I could really smell it. It was pungent. It smelled like sewage," she said. "The next day I woke up feeling awful and I just threw up for 12 hours straight. I've never been that sick in my entire life."
Burkhart's experience is commonplace and a reminder of the decadeslong struggle to address the recurring sewage spills from Tijuana that pollute the shoreline of San Diego County's South Bay region.