A restaurant and a nightclub were forced to close early Friday night when a grease blockage in a Front Street sewer line caused the ground floor toilets in the Emporium Building to overflow.

Gerhard Lipp, the owner of Kathy's Kaffee, a late-night eatery frequented by clubbers, said water began gurgling up through the drains of his restaurant's sinks at about 1 a.m. He called in a plumber to investigate and eventually learned the problem was with the building's toilets.

Citing health concerns, Mr. Lipp closed his restaurant at about 1 a.m., three hours earlier than usual. The Oasis Club, which is scheduled to close at 3 a.m., also shut early. Business at Flanagan's, the Irish pub which also occupies the Emporium's second floor and normally closes at 1 a.m., was not affected, although patrons lost their customary half-hour grace period to finish their drinks.

Corporation of Secretary Roger Sherratt said the backlog was caused by a grease build-up in one of the two sewer lines which run in front of the building, below Front Street.

"The sewage was moving slowly through the main," he explained. "At times, when they were pouring a lot of material through their line, it couldn't go out fast enough."

Mr. Sherratt said the build-up was likely caused by Hamilton restaurants dumping grease down sink drains instead of using traps and leaving the grease to be collected along with their trash.

Usually, the grease makes it through the system without solidifying, or it forms a blockage before leaving the building. Mr. Sherratt could only recall one incident during his ten years with the Corporation where the City's pipes were blocked.

"Our sewer lines are generally in very good condition," he said, adding that engineers regularly examine the system for blocks with a camera which is pulled through pipes from manhole to manhole.

The previous blockage in the sewers also affected the Emporium - according to property manager Leonard Gibbons, the building's toilets overflowed about five years ago.

As Mr. Sherratt explained, the Emporium is especially prone to flooding because the building's outlet line is at the same level as sewage line, whereas most outlet lines are three or four feet higher - and therefore less susceptible to backlogs in the system.

Mr. Lipp suspected the problem resurfaced on Friday because business was especially strong and traffic unusually heavy in the Emporium's bathrooms.

"I was surprised to see so many people out on a Friday after New Year's," Mr. Lipp said. "There were people everywhere."

According to a Police report, the section of Front Street between Hill and Parliament Street was closed to traffic while six men from the Bermuda Fire Service cleared the sewage backlog. The firemen managed to contain the raw sewage to the bathrooms.

Corporation engineers cleared the backlog on Saturday.