‘Its like washing the dishes with dirty dish water’: 13 East Texas cities issue boil water notices so far this month
TYLER, Texas (KETK) — After the artic blast early this month and the recent excessive rain fall, many East Texas cities have issued boil water notices with one still active today.
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In January, there have been 13 boil water notices issues due to leaks, very cold weather and rain fall. Thousands of residents were left without easy access to drinking water.
Areas like San Augustine, Livingston and Lindale experienced main line breaks that can quickly contaminate the drinking water supply.
When the temperatures dropped below freezing, pipes are susceptible to expansion and later burst.
The city of Longview had 15 water main breaks due to freezing compared to the 60 experienced in 2021. The city of Kilgore also worked on 9 line breaks.
This week, due to the constant rainfall the Neches river has excessive flooding that caused the city of Palestine issued a boil notice on Thursday. The water has risen over the banks, pulling debris into the plant system.
“Its like washing the dishes with dirty dish water,” said Kevin Olson, Director of Public Works and Utilities.
As of Friday, the water has not receded and is still over the bank.
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“Our plant is not capable of treating a removing all that from the water to be able to clean it, so its to safe drinkable standards,” said Olson.
The rain set to start back up again tonight meaning the bank could still overflow.
Olson asked that residents to be patient.
“Please be patient. We are doing our best, we are staffing it 24/7, trying to minimize any problems and get us back to normal as soon as we can,” said Olson.
Olson expects the Neches river to start to come down to normal flow levels, Sunday night, hoping not to have to extend the boil water notice past Monday.
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