After a power outage on Sunday, 17 million gallons of untreated sewage were discharged into the Santa Monica Bay which forced public closures on Southern California beaches this week, officials stated Monday night.

The Plant's Only Option

The largest and oldest sewage plant in Los Angeles County, Hyperion Water Reclamation, stated Monday that the plant became inundated with overwhelming quantities of debris, which caused backup of the headworks facilities. The plant added that the spill into Santa Monica Bay, which lasted for eight hours, released at least 6% of the plant's daily load. Officials of the plant stated that the massive discharge was an emergency measure to prevent the plant from going completely offline, and they avoided the plant to discharge much more raw sewage in the ocean.

According to CBS News, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health issued closure orders on Monday for Grand Avenue Storm Drain, Dockweiler State Beach at Water Way Extension, El Segundo Beach, and Dockweiler State Beach at Hyperion Plant. The mentioned beaches based on the order would be reopened once its water quality tests showed that the affected areas do not have an elevated level of bacteria. The Public health department urged residents to avoid contact with ocean water in the affected areas to avoid any health problems.

Despite the statement released by the plant officials saying that the issue was resolved early Monday morning, Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn stated that she was still looking for answers about the incident.

Hahn released a statement, saying that what the plant did was unacceptable and dangerous. The Los Angeles County Supervisor stated that the Hyperion Plant should not just release seventeen million gallons of sewage into our ocean without informing the public hours before the release about what would be happening.

Moreover, Hahn stated that they need answers from the LA City Sanitation regarding what went wrong and what led to this massive spill. The Los Angeles supervisor also noted that they also need to recognize that the LA County Public Health did not properly communicate with the public, which could have put swimmers in danger in the mentioned temporarily closed areas.

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When reached for a comment, the Hyperion Water Reclamation directed the media to the Department of Public Works at LA Sanitation. A spokesperson for LA Sanitation said that the department notified the state's Office of Emergency Services within an hour of the plant's discharge. The spokesperson of the sanitation department described the incident as 'a very unusual occurrence.'

The spokesperson also mentioned that the plant actually diverted a much larger emergency because if the plant had to go offline altogether, it would have been a real crisis.

The state director of the nonprofit organization Environment California, Laura Deehan, said that the spill should never have happened. Deehan called for the passage of a clean water infrastructure bill that's currently moving through Congress to ensure the ability to live the California dream without worrying about the fecal matter that can make people sick or may "contaminate the surfboard or their kids' floating device."

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Written by Jess Smith

WATCH: Several beaches near Dockweiler closed after 17 million gallons of sewage spills into the ocean - Fox 11 Los Angeles