OAKDALE, Minn.—The water main that broke Sunday morning in the eastern Twin Cities suburb of Oakdale and forced the closure of part of Interstate 694 has been replaced and only one resident remains without water, city officials said Wednesday.
About 87,000 cars use that stretch of I-694 each day.
An 11-foot-long crack in the pipe resulted in a leak of more than 1.5 million gallons of water and created a massive washout or sinkhole that is expected to keep I-694 between Minnesota 36 and Interstate 94 closed until at least the weekend.
Nelson said he was "floored" when he saw the crack in the 12-inch water main.
The water main was installed in 1964 — five years before the interstate opened — but age is not believed to be a factor, Nelson said.
"It occurred over time, and we’re at that place where we found out the time is up," he said.
It includes multiple layers — a pipe inside a pipe inside a pipe, he said.
"I think we’re going to have good stability."
How much the repairs will cost won’t be known for several days, he said.
Nelson said crews had received an alert about three hours earlier that water pressure was dropping.

While the Timaru District Council has confirmed on Thursday the water is safe to drink, and is also safe for all other uses, local plumbers like Nigel Kerslake from Temuka Plumbing, said they were "flat out" with calls.
Most of the work they were doing was cleaning filters.
The actual amount of asbestos collected was tiny, but was enough to block people’s filters.
Oostendorp said he understood the results from the tests had come back "very very quickly", and the council had done a good job getting on top of the issue.
A spokesman for Health Minister David Clark confirmed the minister was aware of the issue, but said as it was an operational matter, comment needed to come from the DHB, district council, and Ministry of Health.
Water ‘no risk’ In a statement on Thursday morning, Mayor of Timaru Damon Odey said all professional advice the council has received said that the issue caused no harm to people drinking or washing with the water, but the council was continuing to work to clear the system.
"Asbestos cement pipes were often used in water distribution systems in the past, so it’s not uncommon for there to be some asbestos in tap water.
However, the presence of asbestos fibres in drinking water doesn’t pose a hazard for people drinking the water or using it for washing or showering.
On social media last night the council said it had advice from the Ministry of Health, and was following World Health Organisation advice, that water containing asbestos was not harmful for any usage.
Hawkey said he was not aware of water with asbestos in it drying on skin being a concern, if children had been playing in water.

The water main that broke Sunday morning in Oakdale and forced the closure of part of Interstate 694 has been replaced and only one resident remains without water, city officials said Wednesday.
An 11-foot-long crack in the pipe resulted in a leak of more than 1.5 million gallons of water and created a massive washout that is expected to keep I-694 between Minnesota 36 and Interstate 94 closed until the weekend.
Shawn Nelson, utilities superintendent, said crews were backfilling the site on Wednesday and that the city’s repairs were on track to be completed by Friday.
“We actually are ahead of schedule on our end,” he said during a news conference at Oakdale City Hall.
“This came out of nowhere.” He said crews are still trying to determine the cause of the crack.
The water main was installed in 1964 — five years before the interstate opened — but age is not believed to be a factor, Nelson said.
“We made the choice to replace the whole stretch of main, and it was a good choice.” The new main has been designed to withstand heaving and movement caused by construction equipment and cars and trucks.
It includes multiple layers — a pipe inside a pipe inside a pipe, he said.
“I think we’re going to have good stability.” How much the repairs will cost won’t be known for several days, he said.
Nelson said crews had received an alert about three hours earlier that water pressure was dropping.

– The Village of Unadilla detected E. coli bacteria in its distribution system and is warning residents to boil water before using it.
The boil water notice is in effect until further notice.
Village official Corinne Zahn says they are distributed notices to the post office, bank and community center, and are in the process of hand-delivering flyers door-to-door.
She hopes the notice will last for only a short-time.
“We found E. coli bacteria indicating the need to look for potential problems in the water treatment or distribution,” the release said.
“When this occurs, we are required to conduct an assessment to identify problems and to correct any issues that were found during these assessments.” Do not drink the water without boiling first.
Bring all water to a boil, let it boil for one minute, and let it cool before using.
Boiled or bottled water should be used for drinking, making ice, brushing teeth, dishes and food preparation.
Boiling the water kills organisms.
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PLAINFIELD TOWNSHIP, MI — Wolverine World Wide dumped tannery sludge in a Kent County landfill that closed in 1986 following groundwater contamination problems, according to records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
The county subsequently found records of Wolverine’s use in response to a public records request.
Official testing for contamination from the House Street landfill has not extended east of Belmont Avenue NE to properties adjacent and down gradient of the landfill, which also borders the south side of the DEQ’s Wolven Avenue and 10 Mile testing area, where drinking water wells are contaminated with high PFAS levels.
The investigation into water contamination stemming from House Street and at other known and suspected Wolverine tannery waste dump sites prompted Kent County to start its largest-ever cancer study.
Kent County is awaiting guidance from the DEQ or the Environmental Protection Agency, Baas said.
"We’re really looking for some guidance from the state and EPA," he said, referencing the Kent County Health Department’s request that Gov.
Wolverine has not responded to requests for more information about the North Kent Landfill.
Plainfield Township’s approval was required to dump industrial waste at the landfill.
Carl Huber wrote that Wolverine had been taking sludge to the Granger Grand River Landfill near Lansing after the company was forced to stop dumping at the Northeast Gravel pit in southeast Plainfield Township.
"Since that time, Wolverine has been exploring the alternatives for disposal, including disposing of the filter cake at another landfill site," Huber wrote.

Business Insider Kroger discovered mold in its Comforts for Baby purified water.
The mold can have "serious health consequences" for babies, according to the FDA.
Kroger is recalling the water in its stores in 14 states.
Kroger is recalling its Comforts For Baby brand purified water after the grocery chain discovered mold in the product.
The water tested positive for a type of mold called Talaromyces penicillium that can have "serious health consequences" for babies with immune deficiencies or HIV, according to the Food and Drug Administration.
The mold can also cause asthma attacks and rashes and can irritate the eyes, skin, nose, throat, and lungs, even in people who aren’t allergic to it, the FDA said.
The recall affects products sold in Kroger stores across 14 states.
The FDA has issued a rare consumer alert to notify parents of the possible mold contamination.
"Drinking water or other products contaminated with Talaromyces penicillium may affect infants who have HIV or other conditions that cause immune compromise.
The affected products are labeled "Comforts For Baby Purified Water with Fluoride" and bear the plant code 51-4140 and the UPC number 0 41260 37597 2.

It came from the former American Cleaners.
Already, KDHE has come to talk to residents about the concerns, but Tuesday, the conversation shifted to what they plan on doing about it.
“Those properties get their water from a groundwater well, they’re not provided water by the city of Haysville,” said Tony Martinez, Haysville Public Works Director.
“That’s why we were talking about the capability of the city extending our water utility down south to these properties.” The host of the contamination is near 79th and Grand Avenue and the old dry cleaning business.
You have no idea what it’s doing when it runs over your body in the shower.” This was a shared concern for another resident who lives in the affected area.
So what exactly is she putting into her body.” These are concerns that Martinez says he understands.
Martinez says he is still waiting on 100 of those notifications to come back with permission to fix the problem.
Once all those tests are passed, it’s put in service, then what KDHE does is start installing water lines from the meters to the house.” KDHE will be paying for the process and has already completely changed the water installation in one home.
“We’ve had this project in the motion for a while,” said Bob Jurgens, KDHE.
“We are spending just about $6 million to rectify the issue.” Get breaking news, weather and traffic on the go.

According to water.org, over 500 children in India die every day due to lack of safe drinking water.
Parag tells us, “Every installation has a capacity of up to 15,000 litres per day and serves water chilled and at room temperature.
Specifically for water, India lags the US in accessibility and consistency of clean drinking water.” Affordable and safe “One litre of chilled water is priced at Rs 5.
This can be reduced drastically to as low as Re one per litre for dispensing volumes in multiples of 20 litres when it comes to serving communities living in urban slums and residential colonies.” To lower the price of the water further, Janajal has developed a cascading price model wherein users can receive 20 litres of water for Rs 20.
Parag tells us, “We installed five water ATMs in Khora colony in Ghaziabad where 20 litres of water is being made available at just Rs six, thanks to the support we received from Hans Foundation.” The social enterprise remotely monitors all the ATMs using cloud-based IT infrastructure.
Managing operations and growth JanaJal works with local administrative bodies and government agencies such as IRCTC.
Due to the diverse geographical variations of India, water quality changes rapidly across different parts of the country.
Impact JanaJal currently runs over 300 water ATMs that have been installed under various operating models.
The Government of India has identified this need and is making strides to improve the availability of safe drinking water, and we think JanaJal is a small part of the solution possible.
Too many people in India don’t have easy access to affordable and consistently clean and safe water.

We spent Tuesday speaking to residents about their concerns.
KDHE has come to Haysville on a few different occasions to talk to residents about the concerns but Tuesday the conversation shifted to what they plan on doing about it.
“We’ve had this project in the motion for a while,” said KDHE’s Bob Jurgens.
“We are spending just about 6 million dollars to rectify the issue.” About 240 properties in South Haysville are susceptible to the contaminated water and after speaking with Public works, we learned that ingesting this water could result in cancer.
At one point this, abandoned space was a dry cleaning business.
Now, it’s a space that some residents say, have left a bad taste in their mouth.” “It all started up there at that old dry cleaning spot,” said Haysville resident, Devon Cox.
“We have been working on this,” said Martinez.
Martinez says he is still waiting on 100 of those notifications to come back with permission to fix the problem.
“We are working to fix this but people have to check their mail and get back to us with the permission to work on their home,” he said.
Once all those tests are passed its put in service, then what KDHE does is start installing water lines from the meters to the house.” KDHE will be paying for this process and has already completely changed the water installation in one home.

Napier water shortage: Supermarket denies price-gouging claims as water sales soar 6 Dec, 2017 11:45am 2 minutes to read Bottled water was trucked into Napier yesterday following a run on shop-bought drinking water as a major supermarket denies social media claims of price-gouging in the wake of yesterday’s "water crisis".
Although some shops sold out of water yesterday, residents have been told there is no need to panic buy – with shops restocked and the aquifer seemingly recovering overnight.
Four Square Greenmeadows manager Malik Patel said there was a definite rise in the number of people wanting to buy bottled water with dozens of people wanting to buy water.
Napier reservoir automation system pressed by "extreme" circumstances Other shops reported selling out, with the Taradale Four Square expecting a big delivery today to replenish its sold-out stocks.
Foodstuffs Ltd, spokeswoman Antoinette Laird said more supplies had already been brought into the city.
"Sales of bottled water in PAK’nSAVE supermarkets in the Napier area were pretty brisk yesterday in response to the water reservoir issue.
"More supplies were delivered overnight and yet more bottles are on their way.
She added there was no truth to social media posts suggesting supermarkets had raised prices.
Contrary to rumours circulating on Facebook there have been no increases.
A spokeswoman for the regional council also pointed out that the One pure water bottling plant in Napier would not have had an impact on water levels.