Update: The cause is known, but questions remain. Here’s the latest.
The neighborhoods that were under a boil water advisory from Jan. 19 to Jan. 21.
DC Water does not know what caused residents and businesses in parts of Wards 3 and 4 to experience low water pressure or complete loss of service for a few hours on Friday, January 19th. An agency official says that is “peculiar.”
The water issues led DC Water to issue a boil water advisory Friday evening, as a precaution. The advisory remained in effect until 5 a.m. on Sunday, January 21st, after testing determined no contaminants had entered the drinking water system during the outage.
What DC Water has not been able to determine is the source of the service disruption.
“We have investigated the system thoroughly and, notwithstanding some water main breaks in and around the area, we have identified no major issues within the system that would account for the water pressure/service loss,” Emanuel Briggs, DC Water community outreach director, wrote in an email.
I asked him if that’s unusual. It is “peculiar,” Briggs replied.
DC Water says the reports of service issues started coming in Friday afternoon. ANC 3F Commissioner Courtney Carlson tells Forest Hills Connection that she started getting messages from constituents around 1:30 p.m. Commissioner Marilyn Slatnick reported apartment buildings in the 4600 and 4700 blocks of Connecticut Avenue were experience low water pressure, or no water at all. Commissioner Teri Huet saw DC Water crews while driving crosstown.
Service was restored to all by 4:30 p.m. the same day, said John Lisle, DC Water’s marketing vice president.
“I am told we were able to pump (or “spill”) water into the impacted pressure zone from another part of the distribution system,” he wrote in an email. And as of noon on Monday, he wrote: “We are still investigating the cause of the pressure loss.”
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Patrick says
This is truly something unusual.
There ‘should’ be a reason for the failure – it ‘might’ just take a ‘bit’ more effort to discover what that failure was.
It could have been something very, very minor – but we all know that sometimes, a minor failure, if not treated and resolved (not haphazardly) could balloon to something much larger and MUCH more expensive in the long run. “No kicking the can down the road”.
Sooo, we definitely should not be glossing (?) over something like this that affected so many people in such a large swath of DC….
Merry says
Disappointing to have no idea what caused the problem and subsequent boil advisory. Equally disappointing was the lack of notice once the water was deemed safe to drink. Since a text was sent out on Friday to alert everyone to the problem, why was there no text on Sunday morning as a follow-up? We actually found out from a zoo employee while we were there on Sunday.
Paul says
Glad FHC is on the case — better reporting than WaPo for sure!
Barry Oppenheim says
DC Water Determines Cause of Pressure Loss that Led to Boil Water Advisory
January 23, 2024
(Washington, D.C.) – The District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority (DC Water) experienced an unexpected loss of water supply from the Army Corps of Engineers’ Washington Aqueduct, resulting in a loss of pressure in DC Water’s distribution system on Friday, January 19, 2024.
https://www.dcwater.com/whats-going-on/news/dc-water-determines-cause-pressure-loss-led-boil-water-advisory
FHC says
Thanks! We have an update publishing at 9am.
David Sarokin says
Thanks for following up on this story. Seems we have a true mystery on our hands (or in our sinks…!)
Patrick says
I just sent them the ‘thanks’ below via their marketing/communication VP – Lisle
([email protected])
******* begin copy ******************
There was no comment section on the page.
Let them know – good job in finding the cause of the issue and letting us all know.