We have written about this sort of thing in the past and we will probably write about it many more times in our lifetime… Phony state/county/government representatives going door-to-door claiming they need to test residents’ water, finding a problem, and then pushing additional water testing and/or water purification products on homeowners.

This time some scandalous louts have targeted the Ontario, California area with their lowdown scheme.

Ontario police are warning residents about a scam involving water quality testing.

Several residents have reported incidents where individuals come to their door claiming to be from different government agencies, according to a police news release.

The first report came in June 10, said Suzanne Thomas, crime prevention specialist with the Police Department.

“This woman had gone to this one house and was trying to force these people to purchase a water quality kit,” Thomas said. “This didn’t just happen once, this has happened several times.”

The suspects have documents that appear official, according to the release. Those documents claim the home’s water must be tested for lead or other chemicals. If the homeowner allows the suspect to test the water, the suspect finds it to be contaminated.

The person claiming to be a government agent will then tell the homeowner they must purchase a water purification kit. Reports state the suspects claim water purification is “mandatory for health.”

Ontario police say scam artists often pose as government employees. Homeowners should call the agency of any person who comes to their door, according to the release.

Police also advise residents never to let anyone into their home without first verifying the person’s identity.

According to the Ontario Utilities/Solid Waste Department, the city’s water meets all drinking water standards and is safe without any additional treatment.

Information about city water is available by calling 909-395-2678.

To report suspicious activity, call the Ontario Police Department at 909-986-6711. ( source )

We find using scare tactics to intimidate homeowners, usually elderly homeowners, appalling and think anyone participating in them needs a good, swift caning… or at the very least a lengthy jail sentence during which they can learn firsthand what the terms ‘scared’ and ‘intimidated’ really mean.

• As a general rule, no agent of local, state or federal government will drop by on a random day asking to test your water unless you have received written, verifiable (by phone book, 411, etc.) notification well in advance of anyone showing up on your doorstep w/ a water test kit.

• IF you feel inclined to entertain the stranger at your door, keep the door locked, ask for ID, look up the agency the person works for in the phone book or by calling 411, and verify the validity of the person’s story. Do NOT call a number THEY give as a means of verification since good scam artists will have one or more scam-buddies with phones ready and waiting to field your call and vouch for person at your door.

• No representative of the local water company will try to sell you a water filter system. Period.

• Official looking uniforms, paperwork, badges and appearances mean NOTHING when it comes to proving a random person at your door’s identity. If scam artists can print fake money and reproduce famous pieces of art, then they can surely also print ID badges, generate phony letterhead, and have government/company shirts made.

And last but not least, if you have your water tested regularly by a certified water testing lab such as National Testing Labs and/or perform at-home testing on a semi-regular basis, you will have plenty of information about your water already at your fingertips and can tell the person at your door to politely “go away” before closing the door in their face.

Why? Because ANY water emergency since your last test date great enough to warrant door-to-door testing would have appeared in newspapers, on the television, etc.

Contaminants scam artists may use as reasons for testing

… and as you can see, you can test for them yourSELF — which means they DON’T need access to your home. If tests come up positive, then YOU can call the water department yourself and officially request that someone come out and test your water.

A recent study done on fish and sediment taken from Mountain Island Lake in North Carolina detected higher than expected, and some cases safe, levels of toxic metals and PCB’s.

Toxic chemicals and heavy metals are collecting in the tissue of fish and the sediment beneath the water of Mountain Island Lake, according to a new study out this week.

A recent independent study by the Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation determined that drinking water supplied by the lake is safe but the fish and sediment from the lake contains high levels of unacceptable industrial matter, according to David Merryman, Catawba Riverkeeper.

“I think from these results we should at least evaluate our fish consumption for PCBs, and that’s something I’ll be calling for,” said Merryman.

…

A PCB concentration of 70.7 parts per billion was found in largemouth bass that were tested. That is more than 20 points higher than levels considered safe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, said Merryman.

Mountain Island Lake provides water to Gastonia, Mount Holly and several other municipalities and is also a popular fishing spot for anglers in the area.

Samples of fish also showed signs of barium, mercury and selenium.

…

Any advisories about the consumption of fish would have to come from the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services.

…

The water in Mountain Island Lake proved to be free of PCBs but did include arsenic and barium. Sediment contained arsenic, barium, lead, selenium and mercury. These elements may not surpass acceptable levels, but they are alarming to Merryman.

“This is important. This is the water we drink. It’s where we swim,” he said.

Many of the chemicals detected during the independent test come from the neighboring coal-ash ponds operated by area power plants, according to Merryman.

While the coal-ash ponds are independent of Mountain Island Lake, water is skimmed off the top of the ponds regularly and dumped into the lake.

“Those coal-ash ponds are a source of heavy metals to that lake that a million and a half of us depend on to drink, to cook and wash our clothes,” said Merryman. “We really shouldn’t let industry pump heavy metals into a lake that we depend on.”

Duke Energy is allowed to discharge into the river system under a permit.

…

The Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation contracted with Pace Analytical Laboratories in Huntersville to conduct the tests on Mountain Island Lake.
( source )

We will post more information about the water quality in Mountain Island Lake as we learn it. For now, though, please take a look at the test kits below, as they will work for testing lake water, tap water and well water for potentially hazardous levels of metals in water.

Users of Twitter can now easily follow all future updates to WaterTestingBlog.Com by going here: www.twitter.com/watertestblog.

We hope our posting updates on Twitter will make accessing the information we provide even easier for everyone!

This year the State of Washington plans to take no chances when it comes to getting the jump on a potentially deadly disease known as the West Nile Virus, a disease that made 38 people ill last year in the state… and one of those made sick by West Nile lost their life.

Testing began June 1st, 2010 in Washington and thus far no cases of West Nile have surfaced, but officials indicate that due diligence when it comes to eliminating potential mosquito larvae habitat in the State will definitely help keep the number of biting mosquitoes lower, and thus lowering the risk of a person getting bit by an infected mosquito. ( source )

What does this have to do with water quality?!?!?

So glad you asked. Female mosquitoes require a body of stagnant, untreated water in which to deposit their eggs. In that water mosquito larvae will hatch from the eggs in a matter days, and sometimes in less time, depending on the type of mosquito. Those larvae will then become full-grown bloodsuckers… and they will have a heck of an appetite!

1. Therefore, all you pool, pond, birdbath, and fountain owners need to make sure your water features stay properly treated and never sit stagnant long enough for mosquitoes to use as insect delivery rooms.

2. If you’ve got buckets, pails, old car parts, tires, flipped over lawn furniture, or other yard stuff/junk that can collect water when it rains… knock the water out of as many as possible after each rainstorm. Otherwise each body of water, no matter how small, could serve as a mosquito breeding ground.

3. Keep old wells or any other ‘holes’ that could collect water drained and/or covered — or risk creating the perfect mosquito maternity ward.

4. Keep all gutters and drainpipes free of obstructions so water flows freely from your roof, into the gutters, down the drainpipes, and onto the ground where it (hopefully) gets absorbed quickly.

While not a complete list of ways to keep those pesky mosquitoes under control, following that advice ought to help reduce the number of mosquito larvae in your immediate area… and if nothing else, that’s a great start.

What About Mosquito Traps and Mosquito Netting?

Both excellent ideas for outdoor activities in areas where mosquitoes like to hang out. As humans we can spray areas suspected of harboring mosquitoes all we want, but we will never get rid of them all and devices like the SkeeterVac, which users set up away from their outdoor gatherings, and Mosquito Netting, which users drape over their backyard umbrellas to create a ’safe zone’, make it possible to enjoy the great outdoors anyways.

Moral of the story?

Stagnant water in your yard could lead to having more mosquitoes in your immediate area and it only takes ONE mosquito carrying West Nile to ‘bite’ a human… and make that person very ill.

( Fewer Mosquitoes Overall ) = ( Fewer Infected Mosquitoes )

If you find yourself in possession of a whole house manganese and iron water filter and have a need to replenish the filter’s media, CQ-BR Filter Media offers an effective filtration solution.

In most cases raw water entering the home will contain iron in the +2 ionic state (ferrous) which makes it practically impossible to filter out. CQ-BR Filter Media enhances the oxidation reaction of ferrous iron to ferric iron and produces ferric hydroxide, an easily filtered precipitate.

CQ-BR Filter Media’s physical characteristics make it an excellent filter for removing the precipitate once formed. Simple backwashing of the filter system will then remove the precipitate from the CQ-BR Filter Media bed.

Testing for iron and manganese in water

Iron — To test for total iron in water, meaning both ferrous iron and ferric iron at the same time, most testing systems will require conversion of all ferric iron to the ferrous state first. The Visual Iron Test Kit offered by the makers of SenSafe Test Kits does an excellent job of converting all ferric iron to ferrous iron and then detecting the amount of iron in a water sample. Detection Range: 0.01 ppm to 5.00 ppm

Manganese — One testing option, SenSafe Manganese Check allows users to test for dissolved manganese in water in concentrations between 0.02 ppm and 2.0 ppm in under 3 minutes and eliminates interferences from several common ions such as copper, iron, cobalt, lead, nickel, and others.

We have repeatedly posted information about arsenic remediation systems for residential and small commercial applications, but what about the ‘big boys/girls’ who have arsenic in their water? What about them?

Fear not, because we recently learned that Filter Water a leading retailer of water testing, water filtration and drinking water contaminant elimination equipment has started carrying a line of arsenic removal filters designed specifically for customers whose water requirements range from 15 to 288 gallons per minute (GPM).

A few words about arsenic levels

Based upon a standard dating back to 1942, the USEPA (United States Environmental Protection Agency) enacted legislation that required water systems to make sure arsenic levels did not exceed 50 ppb (parts per billion). More recently, however, health experts and other professionals questioned the safety of water containing 50 ppb dissolved arsenic and in 2001 the USEPA dropped the maximum contaminant level for arsenic in drinking water to 10 ppb.

The debate over what defines a ‘safe’ arsenic level in drinking water will come up again, most likely, because some health officials warn that levels above 3 ppb pose a credible danger to humans.

Need to test for arsenic in water?

For most field/home water testing applications the Arsenic Quick line of water test kits work very well. They have the shorter testing times, safer reagents and greater detection ranges than any comparable test kit on the market.

For information on these kits, visit ArsenicQuick.Com and/or Arsenic-Test-Kit.Com

Although we would all like to think that having chlorine, bromine and/or other sanitizing chemicals in the pool guarantees us a safe swimming experience, science has proven otherwise… and therefore swimmers need to use common sense to avoid getting sick AND making others sick.

Below you will find a list of things we can all do to help keep ourselves and others free of Recreational Water Illnesses:

• Rinse off in a shower before entering the pool. If more people did this, less bacteria would get into the water to begin with.

• Avoid swallowing pool water whenever possible. Reducing the number of opportunities for germs and bacteria to enter your body greatly reduces your chances of getting sick.

• Although it sounds like common sense, if you can’t see the bottom of the pool, you probably ought not get in the water.

• People with diarrhea and people who have gotten over diarrhea recently should stay out of the water. Period. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has labeled diarrhea as the most common recreational water illness and believes swimmers currently exhibiting symptoms and those who have exhibited symptoms in the past two weeks risk contaminating the pool with germs…. and should stay out of the water.

• Babies AND adults who require diapers or diaper-like devices need to wear the ones designed specifically for swimming. No exceptions.

• Teach your children to get out of the pool and use the bathroom rather than stand in the water with a silly grin on their face as they pee in the pool. Sounds nasty, but look around the pool next time you go and if you see a kid, and possibly even an adult, standing on their own and kind of staring off into space… Watch out for the warm spot.

• Though most people already know to wash their hands after using the restroom, some folks believe jumping into a chlorinated swimming pool immediately afterward suffices as a means of washing their hands… and it doesn’t. It does, however, add to the pool’s overall bacteria count. Yuck.

• People with summer colds, allergies or other mucous generating conditions need to keep clear of the water and definitely NOT spit anywhere near the pool. No one wants to swim through your snot or put their bare foot on the boogers you so tactfully blew out of your nostril when you thought no one could see you.

In a nutshell, all the chlorine and bromine in the world cannot prevent a pool from spreading nasty little diseases and illnesses if people don’t use proper hygeine in and around the pool.