Officials are hopeful that the cause of a water outage that has plagued water customers in Ira and Dunn for the better part of a week has been found and that normal operations will resume soon.
The Snyder Water Department issued a statement today stating that a water leak was located this morning in the Ira water line from Snyder.
“(The leak) has been repaired and the system is being brought back on line and will take awhile to pressure up,” the statement read. “Assuming things hold, residents can resume regular water usage later this evening (but) do not drink or cook with Ira water until further notice unless you boil it first.”
Snyder Public Works Director Eli Torres said it was a team effort to find the leak.
“Members of the Snyder Volunteer Fire Department and Snyder Fire Department helped (Ira Water Supply Corp. official) Lonnie (Jones) and his crews were able to locate the source of the problem,” Torres said. “It was on a line that was going up to the Ira plant.”
The water problem first surfaced Wednesday when Ira Water Supply Corp. (IWSC) staff began noticing that the company was losing water, said Darryl Calley, president of the corporation.
“We began looking for leaks,” Calley said. “That same day, we noted we weren’t getting the water volume we normally get from Snyder.”
The corporation ordered bottled water for customers in Ira and Dunn that will be distributed at Ira Church of God. Calley said he did not know when the water would arrive.
IWSC buys water from Snyder that is transported through a four-inch pipeline to a storage facility just east of Ira. It was that line that was the focus of an intense search involving IWSC, Snyder Water Department, Snyder Fire Department and private citizens for the past few days, Calley said.
“There were a lot of people out there looking for leaks Thursday,” said Jan Kruse, an IWSC customer. “We know how old our system is and how old the pipes are and how hard they were working to fix the problem.”
“I’d say it was about three-and-a-half days of little or no water for us,” said Susanna Wilson, another Ira water customer. “We had a little bit of water Wednesday evening, and Friday we had a little bit.”
By Saturday, customer usage had drained the storage facility, Calley said.
“We installed a new booster pump and motor on the main line and were able to get marginal flow to our storage facility,” Calley said. “On Sunday, we repaired three leaks — one in Dunn and two on the line between Snyder and Ira — but we still weren’t getting sufficient water pressure in the lines.”
Water service to Dunn was restored Sunday morning, and to Ira later that day, Calley said.
“Our storage tank is just about at capacity this morning,” he said. “But we’re hoping our customers will be conservative in their water usage. We’ll continue to be under a boil-water notice until further notice.”
Wilson is sympathetic to the plight facing IWSC.
“My husband and I took care of the water business here for 13 years,” she said. “It is a thankless job. It is a 24-hour-a-day, seven-days-a-week job. There’s only one man taking care of it, and the equipment here is 55 to 60 years old, so there’s going to be a lot of problems.”
The boil-water notice will not be lifted until water samples have been tested and approved by a Texas Commission on Environmental Quality-contracted laboratory in Sweetwater.
IWSC will receive a significant equipment upgrade in the near future. Calley said a grant and a loan have been approved for the construction of a new water line and storage facility.
The new line will run from the Houston Street station in Snyder through the Round Top subdivision to the new storage facility on the south side of Ira.
The $4.5 million upgrade should be completed within two years, Calley said.