The party’s over for a Hawaiian stream that smells like beer and boasts a 1.2% ABV
A stream in Waipio, Hawaii was part environmental issue, part all-natural kegger opportunity
Aux Features Beer
Sad news for local teens in Oahu, Hawaii today: A stream in Waipio that was noticed because it stinks like beer has been discovered to have a 1.2% alcohol by volume (ABV) percentage and the storm pipe responsible for boozing up the water has been shut off.
The Party Stream was investigated last week and detailed in an article from Hawaii News Now. It was first noticed by Carroll Cox, an environmental activist who informed the state’s Department Of Health about the water after coming upon a creek and describing its smell as something like “a beer pub that hadn’t opened its doors for three or four days.”
It turns out that the scent was due to a storm pipe whose runoff was contaminating the stream from its origin point at a Paradise Beverages liquor and beer warehouse on the other side of a nearby highway. After testing a sample from the stream, Hawaii News Now reported that “as much as 1.2% of the water was alcohol” and “about .04% of its content” was made up of sugar. What it tasted like, unfortunately, is still anyone’s guess.
Paradise Beverages stated that it wasn’t aware of the spill but is now working with public officials to investigate how its precious alcohol ended up being made freely available to all.
The pipe is apparently closed up now, too, meaning The Party Stream is already winding its operations down. This is good news for the environment, of course, but a real tragedy for the local teenagers who had been able to enjoy slurping up handfuls of free beer-water and the wildlife who had found a brief refuge from the demands of their lives by finding a surprisingly relaxing new watering hole.
[via Boing Boing]
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28 Comments
Land of Sky Blue Waters.
Gotta respect a man who has glass beer mugs on his fishing boat.
I often enjoy an ice cold Hamm’s Beer while snacking on a roll of Jon Hamm’s John Ham.
Going Jeeping with a bear and a beer.
Did I just see two of the guys in that commercial drop the pull tab back into their beer?!? Is that how it was done back in the day? Inquiring minds want to know!
Frequently, yes. Unfortunately, many people took another option: throwing the tabs on the ground. When I was a kid in the 70s, camp grounds were littered with those little metal tabs, which have fairly sharp edges btw. You didn’t want to walk around the campground barefoot.
Wow…that makes complete sense and yet it had never occurred to me, having never come across one of those…thanks for the education and I hope your feet are ok!
I’m genuinely surprised no brewery has tried to bring back that vintage can shape to wrangle in the beer snob hipsters.
As someone present in your comment? Beer Snob Hipsters don’t care about the bottle/can, they care about the contents.
Eh, I worked in a brewery for several years. All things (inside) being equal, there absolutely are people that will go for the “vintage” can over the regular purely for the aesthetic.
Ok snobby
The real snob would insist on a can that required a can opener…
This is exactly how the Budweiser frogs began their descent into alcoholism.
It’s a sad, heartbreaking yet ribbeting tale, really.
But is the Hawaii department of Fish and Wildlife ready for the massive influx of creatures needing to go through detox?
“part all-natural kegger opportunity”
This “kegger” would be much like the kegger in Freaks & Geeks where they can only get non-alcoholic beer.
Look, the Smirnoff Ice has to come from somewhere.
Repurposed, expired Zima?
Hawaii!
I can’t find the video anywhere, so I’m gonna have to just quote the entirety of this Weekend Update bit from 5/14/05, via the SNL Transcripts website:Tina Fey: A truck hauling two thousand cases of beer in Toronto, Canada, flipped over Wednesday and unleashed a sea of alcohol onto the country’s busiest highway.Amy Poehler: Woo-hoo! You guys, ♪party on the highway!♪Fey: Well, it’s not really a party, just beer spilled all over the road.Poehler: ♪Spilled beer on the road! Who’s comin’ with me?♪Fey: It’s not that fun! Just, like, the bottles broken, the beer just, you know, was in the dirt—Poehler: ♪Yeah! I’m gonna drink beer dirt in Canada!♪Fey: Alright, sorry.Poehler: ♪Party highway!♪Fey: It’s not a party!Poehler: If you come, it’s a party!Fey: Alright, I’ll go. But this is the last time that I suck beer out of dirt with you.
That could have been a gold mine for several large American breweries, who could have filled their bottles from this stream and the only complaints from their regular customers would have been that the alcohol content was too high and it didn’t taste enough like watery runoff.
I call that “Coors Light”.
Yeah, the minute I saw “1.2%” I thought, just think of all the American beer jokes just sitting right there.
Damn shame.
So now the stream is back to regular old second hand recycled beer
Underrated comment of the day.
Paradise Beverages stated that it wasn’t aware of the spillThis is a lie, if it isn’t a lie then there must be regulations enacted to prove such a claim, keeping them from “unknowingly” polluting the area as everyone should be able to see the monitoring data.