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A 15-tonne ball of congealed fat - dubbed Britain's biggest ever "fatberg" - was dredged up from a London sewer, utility company Thames Water said yesterday.
It took 10 days to remove the double-decker-bus-sized lump of festering food fat mixed with sanitary wipes which formed in drains under a major road in Kingston, southwest London.

Local residents in the well-to-do suburb complained that their toilets would not flush.
Had the colossal fatberg not been removed, it could have led to raw sewage flooding homes, streets and businesses, Thames Water said.
"While we've removed greater volumes of fat from under central London in the past, we've never seen a single, congealed lump of lard this big clogging our sewers before," said Gordon Hailwood, waste contracts supervisor for the company.
"Given we've got the biggest sewers and this is the biggest fatberg we've encountered, we reckon it has to be the biggest such berg in British history.
"The sewer was almost completely clogged with over 15 tonnes of fat. If we hadn't discovered it in time, raw sewage could have started spurting out of manholes across the whole of Kingston. It was so big it damaged the sewer and repairs will take up to six weeks."

	The sewer was almost completely clogged with over 15 tonnes of fat. If we hadn't discovered it in time, raw sewage could have started spurting out of manholes across the whole of Kingston
Images from inside the sewer showed the rotting mound of fat reduced the 70 by 48-cm drain to 5 per cent of its normal capacity.
While the risk of stomach-churning sewage belching up through people's toilets might have been averted, Londoners could soon be washing with it anyway.
CountyClean Environmental Services, the waste management firm that removed the deposit, said it would go to good use. "We recycle everything that we remove - the water is extracted and the remaining fats and oils are turned into products like soap, biodiesel and fuel," it said.


15-tonne 'fatberg' hauled out of London sewer

Part of the congealed "fatberg" in a London sewer. Photo: AFP

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A 15-tonne ball of congealed fat - dubbed Britain's biggest ever "fatberg" - was dredged up from a London sewer, utility company Thames Water said yesterday.


15-tonne 'fatberg' hauled out of London sewer

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}A 15-tonne ball of congealed fat - dubbed Britain's biggest ever "fatberg" - was dredged up from a London sewer, utility company Thames Water said yesterday.

A 15-tonne ball of congealed fat - dubbed Britain's biggest ever "fatberg" - was dredged up from a London sewer, utility company Thames Water said yesterday.