Don’t drink the water, unless you’re getting it from somewhere other than the Haines Borough’s distribution system.
The public water system tested positive for E. coli bacteria Wednesday, causing the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation to issue a boil order. Residents hooked up to the municipal water system should not drink water without first boiling it for at least two minutes, DEC said.
The presence of E. coli indicates the water may be contaminated with human or animal waste, said Eric Burg, DEC’s environmental program specialist.
Microbes in the waste can cause diarrhea, cramps, nausea, headache and other symptoms, Burg said. These symptoms pose a special health risk to infants, young children and people with severely compromised immune systems.
The boil order is in effect indefinitely, Burg said.
The sample that tested positive was collected on Monday as part of routine total coliform testing. An Anchorage lab returned the results Wednesday, triggering the boil order.
Public facilities director Brian Lemcke said the Piedad spring was the site that tested positive for E. coli. The Piedad system was tied into the borough’s municipal system in October 2012.
The borough must now collect four samples throughout the distribution system, and another source sample at the Piedad spring, DEC’s Burg said.
Lemcke said the borough is sending out the samples Thursday and hopes to get the results back Friday. “If it’s okay, we can lift the boil order,” he said.
The Piedad source currently only uses limited chlorination, unlike the Lily Lake source. Several years ago, the borough did extensive testing on the spring to determine if it was ground water or surface water. When the DEC determined there was some ground water in the system, it told the borough to take steps to further treat the water, Lemcke said.
Those further steps include a $500,000 project that is currently slated for August, which will add a small building at the Piedad source site, upgrade pipes in the area and add a larger chlorination system.
Lemcke said this E. coli incident will likely push the project to the front burner. “The silver lining to this whole deal is it is going to put this whole project on emergency status. That will streamline the whole process and maybe we can get the thing done sooner,” Lemcke said.
Borough staff spent Wednesday posting public notices and knocking on doors to tell people not to drink the water, Lemcke said. “It’s going to be a mess. It’s an unfortunate thing.”
Residents should also boil water they intend to use for brushing teeth, washing dishes, food preparation and other uses that would cause them to ingest the potentially contaminated water.