Without getting too detailed, it means the folks living in the affected areas should observe the following precautions until the boil water advisories get lifted (or canceled):

• Boil water for one minute prior to drinking or food preparation, or use bottled water.
   
• Dispose of ice cubes and do not use ice from a household automatic icemaker until authorities give the all clear notification and you have purged your home’s water lines and the water line leading to the icemaker.
   
• Disinfect dishes and other food contact surfaces by immersion for at least one minute in clean (boiled) tap water or bottled water that contains one teaspoon of unscented household bleach per gallon of water. Note: The more ‘gunk’ a surface has on it, the quicker the bleach level in your wash water will diminish.
   
• Water used for bathing typically does not need to get boiled prior to use however during showering and bathing one should take care not to ingest water. Children should have supervision to discourage accidental ingesting of bath/shower water and persons with cuts, severe rashes or other afflictions of the skin should consult their physician prior to bathing, as unwanted bacteria in the water could possibly enter their body through those areas.
   
• If tap water appears dirty, flush the water lines by letting the water run until it clears before using the water. After the all clear notification goes out you should run water from all available taps, faucets and spigots for a few minutes to purge your home’s water system of older, possibly contaminated water.

What Triggers Boil Water Advisories?

Municipal water systems have a slight amount of pressure in them that forces water out through any available openings in the systems. Usually those openings consist of faucets, drinking fountains, spigots, etc. Water systems do not exist in a stress-free vacuum, though, so over time small cracks, leaks and fissures may form in pipes… and as long as the system remains pressurized no outside matter can typically infiltrate the systems.

But, when a water main breaks or some other event causes a pressure drop to occur in the system, the lack of pressure in the system could allow foreign matter such as bacteria, parasites and/or unwanted debris to slip into the system through those cracks and/or fissures in pipes.

When that happens, water companies will issue boil water advisories through local media outlets. Once water pressure gets restored and tests come back negative for system contamination, water companies will cancel the boil water advisories.

State law required officials to notify customers in the affected area even though they believed no real threat existed to the water supply or its users.

Until the word goes out that the boil water advisory has ended, officials suggest boiling all tap water that will get used for drinking, cooking, washing of food or utensils, making ice, brushing teeth, or used to wash wounds in the event that someone requires first aid. The water should come to a rolling boil for at least 1 full minute.

If boiling water not possibility, residents should use bottled water in place of tap water.

What happens now?

Workers from Sarasota County will collect samples from various points in the water system to check for contamination and once all samples come back with a clean bill of health the ‘all clear’ notice will go out to all customers affected by the water main break.

Most customers will receive a phone call from an automated service one the boil water advisory gets canceled. If anyone has questions about the advisory, or fears they may not have received the call, all interested parties may contact Sarasota County using the following phone number: 941-861-5000.

So, the next time you hear of a (current) boil water advisory or health department offering local residents free or discounted water testing services, please send us the details via our Contact Us Form and we will gladly add them to this site.

Boil water advisories

• Town of Oak Bluffs (Martha’s Vineyard area)
• City of Paris, KY
• Parts of Bossier Parish (Loisiana)
• Fairmont, WV
• Clark County, Indiana
• Mossyrock, WA

Free water testing

• Taos County, New Mexico. July 2 from 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m. at Coronado Hall at the Taos Convention Center

If you know of other boil water advisories or free/discounted water testing offers, please remember to send us the details via our Contact Us Form so we can add them to this site.

Usually when you hear about a boil water advisory it applies to a few hundred or at most thousand unlucky individuals… but THIS advisory affected as many as 1,300,000 people! That had to set SOME sort of World’s Record, right?

Before learning of the boil water advisory some residents called in to complain about discolored water coming out of their faucets.

While the water did look unpalatable, officials at the water treatment facility stated that they preferred to err on the side caution and issue the boil water advisory even though they had very little reason to suspect any sort of contamination by bacteria in the water supply.

What does a boil water advisory mean?

Once issued, a a boil water advisory means affected residents should put water on the stove and bring it to a rolling boil for no less than 60 seconds before drinking or using it to cook, prepare food, wash cooking surfaces, brush teeth, or any activity where the water could wind up in contact with the human mouth.

Experts claim that non-boiled water could get used for washing clothes and for bathing, but while bathing keep you mouth SHUT. Meaning… no singing in the tub, OK?

Moral of the story?

Living in a large, modern city does not guarantee you safe, clean drinking water. Accidents and incidents (i.e. construction workers striking a water main, water treatment facility accidentally over-chlorinates the water supply, a line somewhere between the water treatment plant and your faucet develops a leak, a filtering screen at the water treatment plant, etc.) can happen in any size town, village, city, or thriving metropolitan mecca.

Testing of city water supplies

In Montreal inspectors performing routine water tests noticed something went wrong and quickly responded by issuing a boil water advisory… but what about problems that may develop between the plant and your house?

Quite honestly, the responsibility for noticing any water quality issues at that point belongs to the homeowner and some very sinister water quality issues cannot get noticed with the naked eye. Unwanted water contaminants like bacteria and dissolved metals have no associated taste, color, or odor and can only get detected through water testing.

Can the average person test for things like coliform bacteria and dissolved metals? As a matter of fact they can! Test kits like the WaterSafe Lead Water Test Kit, SenSafe Water Metals Check, and EZ-Cult Coliform (Mug) Test makes testing water at home for lead, other metals, and coliform bacteria a quick, easy and relatively inexpensive process.

Those people, in our opinion, need to keep their opinions to themselves… and feel free to drink as much unboiled water during a boil water advisory as they would like. Just don’t expect us to feel sorry for them when a glassful of parasites decides to take up residence in their digestive tracts.

Think about it. What government body or agency would REALLY want to deal with the general public calling non-stop asking questions about the safety of its water when a boil water advisory gets issued? Also, can you imagine the paperwork and follow-up paperwork that a municipal water department has to do as a result of a boil water advisory?

So please, people… if you hear that a boil water advisory has gone into effect, please do as it says. The inconvenience you experience for a few hours or a few days will definitely beat spending a few days in the hospital as doctors scramble to purge your body of vermin.

Want to get rid of potentially harmful bacteria in your drinking water?

We suggest taking a look the benefits offered by an ultraviolet water purification system. Using a specific wavelength of ultraviolet light these systems have the ability to kill or render harmless virtually 99% of bacteria in water… without the need for harmful chemicals.

For those interested in ultraviolet water purification systems that have tested and certified to NSF/ANSI Standard 55 for Ultraviolet Microbiological Water Treatment Systems, the Trojan UVMAX Pro10, Trojan UVMAX Pro20 and Trojan UVMAX Pro30 UltraViolet Disinfection Systems available at WaterFilters.Net have certified to that standard.

EZ Coliform Cult Bacteria Test Kit

Local officials in an area near the city of Columbia, SC announced recently that residents living in and around the Allbene Park area should boil their water before use…

… and by use they mean for drinking, cooking, as ice, or as a wash solution for food or anything that will come in contact with food.

The reason for the alert: a water main broke and when that happens unwanted bacteria could possibly find their way into the water supply.

Residents of the Allbene Park subdivision in the Hopkins area of Richland County were advised Tuesday to boil their water before drinking or cooking with it.

A break in a water line caused a loss of pressure to Allbene Park residents, the Richland County Utilities Department said Tuesday afternoon. That prompted the advisory, which the department described as a precautionary measure that will remain in effect until further notice.

Residents are instructed to boil water for at least one minute, the department said. In addition, any ice made from water that has not been boiled should be discarded.

Questions may be directed to the department at (803) 401-0050.

Vicinity of Allbene Park. ( source )

Not in the Allbene Park area and want to test your water supply for bacteria anyways? Take a look at the WaterWorks EZ Coliform Test Kit. It allows users to obtain positive/negative test results for bacterial contamination down to the EPA limit of 1 coliform unit per 100 mL of sample.

Need to confirm the presence of coliform bacteria?

Simply shine a UV light source at, or add a Kovacs reagent to, the sample tested using a WaterWorks EZ Coliform Test Kit and that can happen.

NVF-4 Handheld UV Light

The NVF-4 Handheld UV Light on the left acts as a bright and powerful UV light source, excellent for use with either the WaterWorks EZ Coliform Test Kit or the SenSafe Complete Water Test Kit which includes an EZ Coliform Test Kit. If the sample gives off fluorescence when exposed to UV light it contains E. Coli.

]]> http://watertestingblog.com/2010/12/29/water-boil-advisory-richland-county-in-south-carolina/feed/ 0 http://watertestingblog.com/2010/12/16/safe-water-for-christmas-ultraviolet-water-sterilizer/ http://watertestingblog.com/2010/12/16/safe-water-for-christmas-ultraviolet-water-sterilizer/#respond Fri, 17 Dec 2010 03:40:58 +0000 http://watertestingblog.com/?p=3382 We have written about boil water orders all over the country since starting this site several years ago… and just to prove a point, check out these recent stories about communities instructed boil their water because of water main breaks, equipment failures, etc.