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SOMEBODY FLIPPING ONE FUCKING SWITCH WOULD HAVE KEPT AUSTIN IN WATER


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1 minute ago, Scheiss Meister said:

I will wait to see what the problem was/is before deciding how critical to be and who to criticize, but a citywide boil notice in a city the size of Austin is very, very unusual.  Something big had to go wrong at that plant.

It’s not that unusual here. That’s the problem. 

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3 minutes ago, Scheiss Meister said:

I will wait to see what the problem was/is before deciding how critical to be and who to criticize, but a citywide boil notice in a city the size of Austin is very, very unusual.  Something big had to go wrong at that plant.

User name checks out.

"High turbidity" in the system.

Quote

he release says all Austin Water customers and retail customers of Austin Water Wholesale Districts and Utilities should follow the notice.

Here’s a list of the retail customers affected according to Austin Water:

  • Night Hawk
  • Travis County WCID 10
  • Windermere
  • Creedmoor-Maha WSC
  • Morningside
  • Rivercrest
  • San Leanna
  • Marsha WSC
  • Wells Branch MUD
  • Northtown MUD
  • Manor
  • Rollingwood
  • Sunset Valley
  • High Valley
  • Mid-Tex Utilities
  • North Austin MUD 1

 

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They have ways to divert/contain contaminated water before have to call the whole system "bad".  I'm betting a valve failed somewhere, and they had no detection for a really long time.  And with it being a Saturday night, they hold am internal conf call, where a bunch of dumbasses keep saying "I don't know", so they nuke the while thing.

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15 minutes ago, 4th&Five said:

It’s not that unusual here. That’s the problem. 

The news stories I looked at said that it is the first citywide notice since The Ice Age of 2021.  Limited area notices due to broken water mains allowing the water pressure to drop below 20 psi are not too unusual, but a citywide notice is.  They had some kind of major operational issue or equipment failure to cause that much of a problem.  

Disclaimer: I work at the wastewater end of the system, but I have some experience with both surface and ground water production.

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On 11/19/2021 at 7:25 PM, Deej said:

"HI, I'm Emily Chancellor with Austin Water Communications."

What a waste of fucking taxpayer dollars.

Emily is not going to have a great week...

My wife is watching figure skaters drink water before they go skate on frozen water and suddenly I'm jealous of places on earth with potable water...

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1 hour ago, Scheiss Meister said:

I will wait to see what the problem was/is before deciding how critical to be and who to criticize, but a citywide boil notice in a city the size of Austin is very, very unusual.  Something big had to go wrong at that plant.

It happens like twice a year, it feels like.

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If you take the reason given at face value and believe it, then yes the winter storm would have something to do with probably, but not in a way that is from negligence imo. Turbidity is clarity of the water and it gets murky (pun intended) after heavy rains in general. A freeze would be similar in that it captures lots of ground sediment and freezes then it’s all released at once when it thaws. TCEQ probably sets the reporting and shutdown guidelines.l for the city.
 

If you think the city is lying then it could be anything and they’re using a generic excuse to get through it. 

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so just to recap, from memory, just in the last few years: a week-long boil notice a few years ago due to rainstorms; zebra mussels that made the water smell like shit; water meter readers that didn't actually read the meters, causing massive overbilling, losing power (and water to the whole city) last year because no one knew how to flip the switch to turn on the generator; 

now, a boil notice "for a few days" due to an "internal process error."  okey dokey.   Yet Greg Meszaros still gets paid $200K+ from the city.  

Austin is run like a 3rd world country.  

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From the city press release:

Quote

Austin Water, PWS ID TX2270001, failed to meet the minimum treatment technique requirements for the month of February 2022. Specifically, our water system had a a multiple barrier failure treatment technique violation (CFE >1.0 NTU and IFE >2.0 NTU) and combined filter effluent turbidity (CFE) readings above 5.0 NTU.
 
Due to the nature and severity of this violation, the TCEQ has required us to issue this public notice and to tell all our customers that they should boil their water prior to consumption. 

A multiple barrier failure treatment technique violation ... that was my hunch....

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1 hour ago, bschoolprof said:

so just to recap, from memory, just in the last few years: a week-long boil notice a few years ago due to rainstorms; zebra mussels that made the water smell like shit; water meter readers that didn't actually read the meters, causing massive overbilling, losing power (and water to the whole city) last year because no one knew how to flip the switch to turn on the generator; 

now, a boil notice "for a few days" due to an "internal process error."  okey dokey.   Yet Greg Meszaros still gets paid $200K+ from the city.  

Austin is run like a 3rd world country.  

Seriously, I can’t believe more people don’t seem to care about how incompetent Austin Water is.

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51 minutes ago, Scheiss Meister said:

I haven't found detailed information on exactly what kind of filters the Ullrich plant uses, but their website says that they are "gravity filters".  These are often sand filters, which consist of graduated layers of gravel and sand media, with the coarsest media on the bottom and the finest media on the top.  The treated and clarified water is pumped into the top of the filter and flows by gravity through the media.  The media filters the fine particles, including bacteria, that cause turbidity out of the water.

The filtered particles build up on the media and have to be removed by backwashing the media.  This is done by shutting off the flow into the filter, gently pumping filtered water upward through the media.  The water with the solids cleaned off of the media is pumped out as waste and treated further before being discharged or otherwise used.  If the backwash water is pumped too rapidly up through the media, it will stir and mix the media, greatly reducing the efficiency of the filter.  A valve that froze in the wrong position could do this, as could a mistake by the operator or other failures.  Other types of filter media could also be used, with similar need to be backwashed.  Any problem with cleaning the filter or damage to the filter could cause the turbidity problems. 

I wonder what kind of filters are used, what happened to them, and how much greater than 5.0 NTU the turbidity got.

most accurate username on surly. 

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7 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

We haven’t had trash pickup in a week either.

Probably related. I called the city and they basically told me that trash pickup decided to skip the week because of weather. I assume the water treatment workers stayed home also leading to the dirty water.

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9 hours ago, Scheiss Meister said:

I haven't found detailed information on exactly what kind of filters the Ullrich plant uses, but their website says that they are "gravity filters".  These are often sand filters, which consist of graduated layers of gravel and sand media, with the coarsest media on the bottom and the finest media on the top.  The treated and clarified water is pumped into the top of the filter and flows by gravity through the media.  The media filters the fine particles, including bacteria, that cause turbidity out of the water.

The filtered particles build up on the media and have to be removed by backwashing the media.  This is done by shutting off the flow into the filter, gently pumping filtered water upward through the media.  The water with the solids cleaned off of the media is pumped out as waste and treated further before being discharged or otherwise used.  If the backwash water is pumped too rapidly up through the media, it will stir and mix the media, greatly reducing the efficiency of the filter.  A valve that froze in the wrong position could do this, as could a mistake by the operator or other failures.  Other types of filter media could also be used, with similar need to be backwashed.  Any problem with cleaning the filter or damage to the filter could cause the turbidity problems. 

I wonder what kind of filters are used, what happened to them, and how much greater than 5.0 NTU the turbidity got.

Wild ass guess since I don’t do much COA work.  I suspect some kind of backwash malfunction that caused the filter media failure.  The turbidimeter on the discharge may have failed.  That’s enough for a breakthrough.  This was not a clarifier or chlorination failure.  And yeah as far as surface water treatment goes violating NTU standards is as bad as it gets for normal failure.  Beyond that it’s some kind of chemical feed issue or source water contamination.

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