Hundreds in Okanagan Falls under Boil Water Notice

An estimated 600 customers in the lower zone of the Okanagan Falls Irrigation District are now under a Boil Water Notice.

The notice was put in place after a routine test came back positive for E. coli.

The chair of the irrigation district said they’ve now taken three additional samples and hope to find out the results of those tests on Friday.

“We’ll be continuing with the boil water advisory at least through the weekend and probably well into next week. The idea is just to make sure that if there is a chance that there is any contamination in the system, we are not going to risk anybody’s health over it,” Bob Daly, irrigation district chair, said.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "We'll be continuing with the boil water advisory at least through the weekend and probably well into next week. The idea is just to make sure that if there is a chance that there is any contamination in the system, we are not going to risk anybody's health over it," Bob Daly, irrigation district chair, said.

Daly said he hopes the first test result will turn out to be a false positive.

“If we find that over time that there is no further evidence of contamination, then it could be a false positive or false reading,” Daly said.

In an emailed statement, the irrigation district advised impacted customers to “bring all water to be consumed to a rolling boil for at least one minute and let it cool before transferring into a clean container and storing in the refrigerator, or use bottled water.”

The irrigation district says customers in the lower zone should boil their water not just for drinking, but also for brushing their teeth.

The irrigation district said no one has reported falling ill.

The map below shows the location of the different zones in the irrigation district.

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– with files from Angela Jung