The good news is that the sewer line has now been reattached with a standpipe/cleanout at the wye connector, and the line itself has been cameraed all the way to the main sewer and no breaks or big roots were found.
The bad news is that the pipe is clogged with gunk. I won’t go into the likely composition of said gunk. The gunk means that they now need to pressure-wash it out, which requires the services of a big truck with a pressure washer device on it. For another $475 or so. After this whole day of digging a hole in my yard and filling it back in has cost $1,250 plus another $89 for yesterday.
However, it beats the hell out of $4-$5K to dig the whole thing up and put it in new. So I am not complaining.
We used ARS. We’ve had them out here before to clear the kitchen drain, which has a tendency to get crapped up after we have a large dinner party. Michael and Adam and Kurt were the best. It’s a shitty job, no pun intended, and I’m glad they were the ones doing it.
UPDATE: The correct technical term for the process of cleaning out the gunk with high-pressure whatever is “jetting”.