Source of E.coli contamination in Wellington water still a mystery.
E.coli levels are still increasing in Wellington water, as officials try to track down the source of the contamination.
Lower Hutt’s water supply is being chlorinated, while artesian water wells in Petone and Dowse Square have been closed.
November’s Kaikoura earthquake is being put down as a possible cause of the contamination.
Lower Hutt mayor Ray Wallace said there was no issue more important than the safety of drinking water.
"We know many residents really value access to unchlorinated aquifer water, but public safety will always be our number one priority.
Wellington Water acting chief executive Mark Kinvig warned the situation wouldn’t get a quick fix.
"We’re carrying out investigations into the source but this is expected to take many months to complete."
Greater Wellington Regional Council chair Chris Laidlaw said they weren’t taking any chances with public health.
"We immediately chlorinated Lower Hutt’s water supply in response to the recent positive E.coli test, and we’ll continue to chlorinate while we investigate the source of the results.

King George County officials said monthly water samples taken April 14 from Oakland Park Waterworks—the public water system that last month was under alert—showed no evidence of bacteria. “It appears that we may never know how the E. coli entered the system,” said Christopher Werle, chairman of the King George County Service Authority, which owns the Oakland Park system and eight others in the county. Oakland Park Waterworks services about 330 customers, including Sealston Elementary School, the King George Industrial Park and Oakland Park subdivision. From March 24–29, customers were told it wasn’t safe to drink the water without boiling it or treating it with purification tablets. Water samples from two homes in the Oakland Park subdivision showed levels of E. coli, which usually means there’s been sewage or animal waste contamination. Werle said E. coli contamination usually is found in shallow private wells with little to no monitoring or safeguards. It rarely occurs in…

E coli still in Hutt drinking water leading authorities to continue chlorination.
Chlorine is to continue being added to Lower Hutt’s water supply as a precautionary safety measure after E coli contamination was detected.
The Hutt City Council said the chlorination would continue while investigations into the source of the recent positive E coli test results were under way, and emphasised that the water remains safe to drink.
A sample from a bore in the Waterloo wellfield returned a positive E coli test result on April 12 – the third positive result in five months from water sourced from the Waiwhetu aquifer.
* Chlorine added to water in Lower Hutt as precautionary measure * Wellington Water to stop chlorination of water in Lower Hutt * Prime minister talks down mandatory water chlorination * CuriousCity: How Wellington’s drinking water is kept free of contamination Recent water quality testing across the aquifer had shown an increasing amount of bacteria activity, which had resulted in the council’s decision to continue chlorinating the water.
We immediately chlorinated Lower Hutt’s water supply in response to the recent positive E coli test and we’ll continue to chlorinate while we investigate the source of these positive results".
Lower Hutt mayor Ray Wallace said safe drinking water was of the utmost importance.
"We know many residents really value access to unchlorinated aquifer water but public safety will always be our number one priority.
Wellington Water acting chief executive Mark Kinvig said the cause of the positive test results was not known yet, but it was possible it was related to the November 2016 Kaikoura quake.
– Stuff

BREAKING NEWS: Forest Springs bottled water recalled due to possible contamination.
– The Saint Lucia Bureau of Standards (SLBS) wishes to advise the public that Forest Springs Bottled Water is being jointly recalled by the Saint Lucia Bureau of Standards and Forest Springs Ltd, due to concerns about possible contamination of the 1.5 litre size bottle of that product.
As a precaution the recall affects all Forest Springs Water which carries the best before date codes of 31927/04/18.
Customers are advised not to consume the affected products bearing the codes.
The company has instructed all outlets which carry the brand to remove the affected batch of water from their shelves as of Friday April 21st 2017.
Distribution of new batches of the bottled water has ceased until full inspection and certification by the Saint Lucia Bureau of Standards.
A preliminary investigation suggests a mechanical failure as the cause of the possible contamination of the water.
The company is working with the SLBS to determine the definitive cause of the problem.
Following this, immediate action will be taken to prevent its reoccurrence.
Once the SLBS’s assessment process is complete a full statement will be released to the public on the status of the company’s bottled water products.

Nearly 400 military bases must be tested for drinking water contamination — and it will take years.
The Air Force, for instance, has completed sampling at nearly all of its targeted bases; the Navy, barely 10 percent.
But with so many sites to evaluate, the cleanup "is not super-simple to do," said Mark Correll, a high-ranking Air Force official.
Research on other potential health effects is ongoing, and some experts contend even water below the EPA’s health advisory level is unsafe.
So far, water in only three wells there has been found to be contaminated above the level the EPA says is safe.
In Newburgh, N.Y., where drinking water was tainted by the foam used at an Air National Guard base, officials are pressing the military to pay for connecting city residents to a new clean water source.
Officials then started paying more attention to the chemicals as the EPA began focusing on them, said Correll, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for the environment, safety, and infrastructure.
“Once we’ve assured that … you’re talking eight years to get yourself to a remediation solution.” Navy officials established a policy for the testing and cleanup last June, a month after the EPA released new guidelines, and have completed sampling at 11 of 127 bases.
He said it was “hard to say” what bases would be tested next because officials did not want to alarm residents before notification or sampling began.
The Army will follow the same process as the Navy and Air Force, a spokesman said, but inspections at 61 bases have not yet begun.

West Milford finds fix for school’s radioactive water.
WEST MILFORD – A custom water filtration system is coming to Upper Greenwood Lake Elementary School, where elevated levels of radioactive particles have contaminated the water supply.
Quarterly test results reported to the state since last summer show uranium and radium levels in the school’s well water have been below the federal maximum permitted for drinking water.
The school, which is on the town’s northwest plateau on Henry Road, has been reliant on bottled water since early October 2016 and will be for the foreseeable future, officials said.
High levels of naturally occurring uranium in drinking water are more likely in the Highlands than other parts of the state due to the region’s geology, according to DEP records.
Radium and radon, other naturally occurring radionuclides formed from decaying uranium, can also be found in the area, records show.
The contractor, Equity Environmental Engineering, is also working on a project to abate radiation contamination in neighboring Vernon, said district Business Administrator Barbara Francisco.
“They’re very much aware of the problems because they are involved in a similar situation in Vernon,” she said.
New Jersey was the first state to start using the radium-224 testing method for radioactive particles in drinking water 20 years ago.
Radioactivity in drinking water is not a modern occurrence, but testing standards were not created by the EPA until 1977.

Health officials rescind boil water advisory for Moundridge.
MOUNDRIDGE, Kan. (KAKE) – The Kansas Department of Health and Environment has rescinded a boil water advisory for Moundridge in McPherson County.
The KDHE issued the advisory because of a line break resulting in a loss of pressure in the system.
The City of Moundridge has issued a boil water… https://t.co/3pppMNNyRn — City Of Moundridge (@CityofMoundridg) April 19, 2017 A statement from City Administrator Randy Frazer said the advisory was issued due to a loss of pressure in the water system.
That loss can increase the risk of bacteria contaminating the water supply, along with a loss of chlorine residuals.
In the meantime, the KDHE offers these tips: 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.
Disinfect dishes and other food contact surfaces by immersion for at least one minute in clean tap water that contains one teaspoon of unscented household bleach per gallon of water.
Water used for bathing does not generally need to be boiled.
Supervision of children is necessary while bathing so that water is not ingested.

We all like to keep things clean, and disinfectants help that happen. Unfortunately, one of the most widely used antimicrobial products in use since 1964, triclosan, is also one of the top 10 environmental contaminants in rivers – possibly disrupting the endocrine systems of wildlife and causing toxic effects to their reproduction and development. Now, a new study at the University of Nevada, Reno has found a potential way to reduce the presence of the antimicrobial that is also linked to problems with antibiotic resistance. “The results are promising that we gained better understanding about how triclosan is degraded in the natural environment, and can potentially find a way of removing the contaminant from the environment and in the long term fighting the antibiotic resistance problem,” Yu “Frank” Yang, assistant professor of environmental engineering at the University, said. Yang and his team’s research on how to reduce the presence of triclosan in the environment was recognized among Emerging Investigator Series by the journal Environmental Science: Processes & Impacts, a publication of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and published in the April edition as the inside front-cover story. The article describes how the triclosan, used for things like hand sanitizer, detergents, soaps and paints, can be degraded faster in the environment through a process with a combination of metal-reducing bacterium and natural organic matter. While the nation is phasing out triclosan and finding replacements for the detergents, it’s pervasive in the environment and is persistent under certain environmental conditions,…

MOUNDRIDGE, Kan. (KSNW) – The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) has rescinded a boil water advisory for the City of Moundridge located in McPherson County. The advisory was issued because of a line break resulting in a loss of pressure in the system. Failure to maintain adequate pressure may result in a loss of chlorine residuals and bacterial contamination. As a result of the issue, Moundridge public schools were canceled on Wednesday. Public water suppliers in Kansas take all…

Family reaches settlement with Dartmouth over water contamination.
Union Leader Correspondent HANOVER — Dartmouth College has reached a settlement with the Higgins family who said they suffered health problems from drinking well water contaminated by runoff from a site where the college once dumped animals used in scientific experiments.
The college issued a statement Wednesday saying it and the Higgins family “have reached a negotiated settlement of all claims related to contamination of the drinking water well at 9 Rennie Road.” It said it will allow the family of Richard and Debbie Higgins “to move on with their lives in a new location.” “We’re just happy that we are being able to move on,” Richard Higgins said Wednesday.
He said they are hoping to stay in Hanover, but it depends on if they can find a suitable building lot on which they can build a wheelchair accessible home for themselves.
Higgins would not comment on the details of the agreement.
The Higgins revealed in Febuary 2016 that they were in mediation with the college after their water tested at 6 parts per billion of 1,4-dioxane, exceeding state standards of 3 parts per billion.
The chemical was used in the animal experiments.
The Environmental Protection Agency classifies 1,4-dioxane as a probable human carcinogen and says exposure may cause damage to the central nervous system, liver and kidneys.
The lab animal dumping ground was used by Dartmouth’s medical school from 1960 to the mid-1970s and operated under a state license.
mpierce@newstote.com