St. Anthony's Mobile Trailer Park
Location: Mecca
Description
St. Anthony's Trailer Park residents fear their water may be unsafe. They report smelling a strong order after leaving water in containers for a couple of days. Additionally, they report heavy sediment in the water. They want to know what's in the water and whether it's safe to use for drinking.
Comments (2)
-
George Duran
We brougth the issue up in a council meeting about two or three months ago. Mr. Carranza said that he was going to show test results and the people from the county that checks water quality was going to be at the council meeting but that never happened...as always.
-
Jon Rokke
Residents at St Anthony's Mobile Home Park currently receive two varieties of water, both originating from the parks new well. Because of high arsenic levels in the groundwater, drinking water must first go through a reverse osmosis (R.O.) and filtration system to remove contaminants, thus making the water safe to consume. This treated water is testing on a regular basis by the system operator, and the testing results are submitted to the County Department of Environmental Health. All recent test results indicate this treated water is safe to drink.
Due to the nature of the filtering and R.O. treatment that takes place for drinking water, it is almost impossible for sediments to be found in the treated water. This leads me to believe that the water reported as having "heavy sediment" is the non-treated, second type of water that comes from the well directly to the taps in St Anthony's mobile homes. This tap water should not be used for drinking at St Anthony's, and residents should obtain drinking water from R.O. treatment facility.
The system operator reports that excess sediments in the tap water may be due to a water truck filling up from the fire hydrant and stirring up sediments in the aging piping system. An effort is being made to find a different location to fill the water truck so as not to stir up sediments.
So in conclusion and in response to this Report, the treated RO water is safe to drink, and the water coming out of the tap in the mobile homes should not be used as drinking water due to high arsenic levels. Efforts are underway to reduce the amounts of sediment in the tap water.