Enough with the Water Problems!
Did this make the news outside Massachusetts? Probably, because we're in a state of emergency again. And again it's water, but this time from a pipe. Today the main aqueduct supplying water to most of the greater Boston area broke, sending our drinking water gushing into the Charles River. This is the new tunnel that was built less than a decade ago, and was expected to safeguard us against a break in the old aqueduct (which is now under renovation and not in service).
Our water utility, the MWRA, switched to backup reservoirs, which are not of drinkable quality. So starting today, and for who knows how long, we have to boil our drinking and handwashing and food-prep water. And when it's all over, we're going to be flushing the pond-scum out of our pipes. That could be days or weeks from now. The section of pipe that broke was a custom-made, 10-foot wide, stainless steel pipe installed just six or seven years ago. I'll bet they don't carry those down at Ace Hardware or Lowes.
By the time I got to the supermarket to see if there was any bottled water left, you couldn't even buy seltzer. Looks like I knew what I was doing when I laid in a stock of beer the other day.
I don't know how long this link will be good, but here's a story on our local Channel 5 that shows the break in the pipe:
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/video/23399055/index.html
Labels: personal news, public affairs
posted by Jeffrey A. Carver @ 1:38 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
I wonder what the poor people of Concord are going to do since they voted to outlaw the sales of bottled water in their town.
I wondered that, too. And then I noticed, Concord is not on the list of affected towns. Don't know where their water comes from, but it's either not MWRA, or their feeder comes before the break. Still, the irony was inescapable.
I survived a trip to Thailand by drinking nothing but bottled beer. Everyone else I traveled with drank the local water, or bottled water (which was usually just refilled from the tap) or forgot to get drinks without ice made from local sources - and each one got the Thai equivalent of Montezuma's Revenge.
Rarely have I enjoyed being a beer drinker more than while on that trip, watching everyone try to purge their toenails from the inside out.
BTW, Phuket (real name) and Singha beers are quite good, regardless of whether you're drinking them for enjoyment or out of necessity.
They lifted the boil-water order this morning! Clean! I feel clean!
I think my brother told me about Phuket, after a trip he took to Cambodia. Singha is in all the Chinese restaurants around here, and the import version tastes pretty much like swill. (I still usually order it for the cultural experience, though.) Or wait--maybe I'm thinking of Tsingtao. I know I've had Singha, but I think it's Tsingtao that's ubiquitous.
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