Two pipes broke from their sub-Snake River holdings near the Wilson Bridge on Friday and bobbed near launching boaters, but a third line carrying sewage remained intact, officials said.

Readings at an effluent pump station in Wilson showed normal pressure in the line, meaning the Wilson Sewer District pipe was still moving sewage, said Bob Norton, of Nelson Engineering, the firm that designed the system.

Sewer district officials planned to monitor the pressure and hire trucks to haul sewage from the west bank if the third line breaks. The situation is complicated by high flows from runoff and elevated releases from Jackson Lake Dam.

“We’re still in peril,” Norton said Friday.

Wilson Sewer District Board President Tony Wall asked district customers to reduce the amount of sewage they generate.

“Hopefully, people will make an effort to refrain as much as they can until we get this thing fixed,” Wall said.

The system pushes approximately 40,000 gallons of effluent across the river every day, Wall said. The pipes were supposed to sit seven feet below the river’s scour depth, he added.

The two black pipes protruding from the river were unused. Lower Valley Energy paid for the lines in case it planned to install a natural gas delivery system on the west bank.

As the pipes bobbed in the water on Friday, recreators launched and landed at the boat ramp just north of the bridge. Wall said he was thankful the sewer line had not ruptured, contaminating the river.

Norton planned to keep the line running, and had not decided on a course of action to ensure the integrity of the sewer line.

“I got a couple plans,” said Norton, who was in Montana on Friday, but was staying in touch via phone.

Snake River flows remain high as snow continues to melt in the high country.

At a Moose gauging station, the Snake River was flowing at 12,800 cubic feet per second, while at the gauging station for the river at its confluence near Flat Creek the flow rate was 15,100 cfs. Both flows are more than double the average for this time of year.

 Bureau of Reclamation was releasing 5,455 cfs out of Jackson Lake dam.

The sewer district serves the equivalent of 300 homes in pockets on the west bank, Wall said. The roughly $10 million project to move effluent off the west bank and to the waste water treatment plant in South Park was completed in late 2004. The project was paid for, in part, with specific purpose excise tax money and was designed to reduce septic tank use in a region of the valley with a high water table.