Thousands of south Okanagan residents can’t drink the water coming out of their taps this weekend. The community of Summerland is under a boil water notice as water system repairs are completed. However, the inconvenience was originally expected to be far worse.
Originally the District of Summerland thought it would have to shut off water entirely from Friday evening to Monday morning so the work could be done.
“That would have been more difficult especially for older people,” said resident Lili Karpan. “This is, I think probably, the best that they could have done. It is working really well so far.”
Instead, the district was able to supply water to most residents from alternative sources during the repairs. Only around 56 connections don’t have water.
A number of businesses are closed due to the water situation and some residents have made plans to be out of town during the water system repairs.
The mayor said the inconvenience is unfortunate, but the work needed to be done. Peter Waterman explained the district wanted to proactively fix the system instead of waiting for it to fail.
“It is far better to do large works like this under very controlled conditions than to have something happen that you are not controlling, to have valves break or whatever and you have to deal with a situation where you are not in control,” said Waterman.
The district is expecting the work to be completed Sunday afternoon. After that it will be another 4 to 10 days till the boil water notice is lifted.
Comments