GILES CO., Va. – UPDATED
As of noon Thursday, the boil water advisory for Giles County has been lifted.
We’re told that water sampling results have confirmed that water in this area is now safe for consumption and may once again be used for drinking and cooking.
ORIGINAL STORY
People in Giles County have been on a water boil advisory since Tuesday, forcing schools to go online and for people to rely on bottled water to drink and cook with.
“Because the test failed, even though it was by a small margin, the water quality can’t be guaranteed if the test fails,” said Andy Crocker, chief water plant operator for Giles County.
Over the weekend, officials in Giles County said they had some routine maintenance when they noticed one of the filters at the water plant started malfunctioning.
“We lost the programming to this particular set of filters here,” Crocker said.
He said after some problem-solving, they thought they had the issue resolved.
“The next day we noticed there is a certain test procedure that needs to get certain results in order to test the integrity of the filter,” said Crocker. “The results were a little bit off.”
Once the problem continued, that is when they had to contact the health department for some extra help.
“We collected a series of water samples around the county and sent them to a commercial lab for analysis,” Crocker said.
He also said they have people working on this issue, and already have a timeline to get water back to folks.
“The results of the first round of tests should be in by before lunchtime [Thursday, March, 7],” said Crocker. “So, it really depends upon how quickly the process moves after that.”
He said people should take boil notices seriously.
“Even though chlorine is added to the water there are certain microorganisms that are resistant to chlorine,” Crocker said.
Due to the boil advisory, Giles County Public Schools were in a virtual school day. School officials said kids will be back in the classroom the rest of this week.
They said each classroom will have cases of water to ensure adequate water is available.