HELENA-WEST HELENA, Ark. — Residents of an eastern Arkansas town have been without water for the past two weeks after the state was hit by sub-freezing temperatures, and the outage forced them to line up for bottled water, filling up. urn or bath in a truck brought in by the state.
The outage that affected about 1,400 residents of Helena-West Helena was the second in the past year for the small town 52 miles (84 kilometers) southwest of Memphis, Tennessee, which lies along the Mississippi River.
The town faced a similar crisis last summer, when the same part of the town had no water in June.
Local officials are racing to repair leaks across the city and restore water to residents, but they say they face long-term challenges in overhauling a system with decades-old infrastructure.
“The issue we’re facing now has been building for decades,” said John Edwards, a former state legislator and executive director of an industrial park the mayor has tapped to help deal with the water crisis.
The outage affected one of two water systems for Helena-West Helena, which were two separate cities until 2006. One of the wells supplying the system failed during the state’s winter weather, under stress from leaks and leaking pipes.
“It’s hit or miss,” said Russell Hall, director of the Phillips County Office of Emergency Management. “One house may have a good halfway pressure, and another house may be leaking, depending on gravity and other things.”
George Jackson fills a gallon jug of water, while other Phillips County workers distribute water to people without water on Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024, in Helena, Arkansas. AP
The state National Guard has brought in water trucks to provide potable water, and 16-stall portable showers have been brought in for residents to use. Every day, the water distribution site has seen queues of people filling up water to use for their homes.
“It’s so hard when you wake up in the morning and you can’t shower, you can’t shower,” said Mack Williams, 59, as he picked up bottled water from a county distribution site. “You have five, six, seven, eight people in the house, it’s very difficult.”
Gerald Jennings has used a yellow bucket to catch rainwater to boil, then use for bathing and flushing the toilet. He said he knows others do the same.
Phillips County fills a gallon jug while other workers distribute water to people without water. AP
“I have to use what nature gave me, which is the rain,” said the 58-year-old retiree as he stood outside his home. “We’re lucky it’s raining at this time.”
Laprece Stayton, a 40-year-old beautician, was fetching water at a distribution site. He said he has running water in his home, but the pressure is low and it comes out “a little yellow, a little discolored.” He is boiling water or not using it at all.
He said he was fine because he felt he wasn’t affected as badly as others and he didn’t blame anyone for the issue.
“It’s nobody’s fault,” he said. “If you have a car, you can’t keep it for 60 years without wear and tear on it. Pipes will have wear and tear on them.”
Phillips County is bringing in Mobile Shower units. AP
Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders last week urged a state commission to fast-track a $100,000 emergency loan for the city to rehabilitate two wells and replace valves in the city’s water system. The Arkansas Natural Resources Commission has since approved the second $100,000 loan the panel has issued since last year’s crisis.
Sanders called the loan “part of my administration’s larger effort to help the city modernize its water system and prevent future system failures.”
Hall, the county’s director of Emergency Management, said he did not know when the water would be restored. He said the people generally understood the emergency water distribution process.
Jonathan McDowell, with the National Guard, helps Phillips County workers distribute water. AP
“I’m sure people are disappointed,” Hall said. “Three quarters of my 911 dispatchers don’t have water in their homes right now. They have to come to work and still have to go about their daily lives.”
The bigger question facing the city is how much long-term repairs to its water system will cost, and who will pay for them. Edwards said it will cost about $5 million to fix the failed well and make repairs to the water plant and other wells that will help prevent the city from landing in a similar crisis within six months.
The city’s water outage comes as other cities face problems with their aging water infrastructure. Several other cities faced water shortages in Arkansas during winter storms. And in neighboring Tennessee, the rural town of Mason has been without water for a week after freezing temperatures broke a pipe and caused a leak in its neglected system.
Residents in three rural communities in far eastern Kentucky along the Virginia border were also without water for more than a week after the freezing weather.
“What’s happening here can and will happen elsewhere,” said Edwards, the director of an industrial park that helped during the water crisis. “We have a lot of utilities in this state that are suffering from aging problems, and I hope this will be a cautionary tale for what officials in other communities can do to avoid being in this situation.”
Categories: Trending
Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
