Pooper Scooper

I've had several questions from the students regarding exactly how we use toilets and how that system works.  Here are some pictures that help explain how we get rid of the waste in the holding tanks.

1.  Use the toilet just like at home and flush.  Our flush lever is a pedal on the lower side of the toilet.  We have fresh water pumped from our fresh water holding tanks in the toilet just like you do at home.  Some boats  pump water directly from the sea/river where ever they are. When you flush, everything goes into a holding tank inside the boat, down below in the engine room.  We can't really smell nor see anything.

 2.  We use a special quick dissolving toilet paper that we buy from a marine store that costs a lot more than regular toilet paper.   This special toilet paper dissolves quickly so that when we pump out the holding tank, the paper doesn't clog up the small hose that is pumping the waste out into a tank on shore.  That on shore tank gets emptied by the sanitation department and put into the sewer systems, just like in a city to be disposed of.

3.  The photos show Andy pumping out the front toilet in the v-berth area yesterday.

Andy putting pump out hose into tank outlet on the front starboard side of the boat

Close up of the hose going into the tank on the boat. That big round metal thing is just an extra fitting sitting on the deck in case he needed a different size nozzle

See the pump out hose running from the dock to the side of the boat where the holding tank is

What I call the 'pooper scooper'.  This is where the waste from the holding tank is being pumped into from the boat.  This tank will be ultimately emptied by the local city sanitation department & disposed of along with all the other waste from the City.

It is legal to dump from the holding tanks into the Ocean if you are 3-5 miles out offshore.  We adjust some buttons and levers and it pumps straight out into the water.  We prefer to never do this, not liking to pollute and try to use marina pump out stations.  However, in some countries there are NO pump out stations.  I find that so unbelievable but that is the way it is.  Those countries believe that the ocean currents take the poop/pee away quickly.  I think someday this will all catch up to us!!

Hope this helps you understand it all!