BIG CHILL
Dedication and teamwork with Jones County and City of Gray water employees kept a bad situation from getting worse.
The frigid temperatures that arrived Christmas weekend created the perfect storm, but most of Jones County dodged the fate of the people living in Haddock, who were without any water for more than 24 hours.
Jones County Water Superintendent Brandon Stark said water department employees were out until the wee hours of the morning Christmas Eve and Christmas Day repairing leaks and doing everything possible to keep the water flowing.
Stark said there was a problem with frozen water lines and leaks at residences. He said the water system itself had about 10 leaks that had to be repaired, but that was not what caused the water tanks to run so low.
“The biggest culprit was all the dripping facets in houses. That pretty much drained our water tanks,” the superintendent said.
Stark said people thought they had to run water in every sink in their homes, which is not the case. He said Jones County can produce 2.5 million gallons of water a day, but all the dripping was using six million gallons.
“The demand was definitely more than the supply. We also supply the City of Gray, and the same was happening there,” he said.
Stark said that was what happened in Haddock, which is a stand-alone water system. He said that system ran completely out of water Christmas night, and it was 24 hours before it could catch up.
Because the system ran completely out, a boil water notice had to be issued.
The superintendent said as of 1 p.m. Thursday afternoon, however, that small system had recovered. He said they would be flushing the lines Friday and would lift the boil water requirement as soon as possible.
When asked the answer of how to handle the situation better in the future, Stark said there is no easy answer.
“Georgia is just not built for that kind of weather. Pipes are not insulated, and the severity of the weather was underestimated,” he said.
Stark did say water does not have to run in every sink in the home to keep the pipes from freezing. He suggested finding out which sink is furthest from the water meter and only run a small stream of water in that one.
He said that should keep enough water flowing throughout the waterline to keep from freezing.
The superintendent said perhaps the best idea is to have a plumber look at the pipes in order to be prepared if this happened again.
“I don’t think people realized how much water they were using, but they will when they get their water bills,” he said. “Water is a precious thing that everyone needs.”
Stark said it was absolutely a panic situation, but Jones County is moving in the right direction now.
“All of our water tanks were running dangerously low, but we never ran out. It may be a week or more before we are back to normal,” he said.
He praised county water employees for what they did to keep the water running. The superintendent said a special thank you to Stevie Johnson and David Foster for operating the county’s water plants.
Stark said Gray and Jones County worked together the entire time of the freezing temperatures. He said he and Gray Superintendent Cheyenne Morgan have been working closely together throughout the holidays, and both joked that they spent the holidays together.
Morgan said he has worked with Gray’s water system for 26 years and had never seen anything like what happened over the holidays. He said the city’s water storage tank is still empty, but there is water in the standpipe.
“We are maintaining. We’ve not losing but not gaining,” he said.
Morgan said the city gets half of its water from the county. Fortunately, the city’s system did not have any major breaks during the freeze with the majority of frozen pipe issues being residential.
“People letting their water run was definitely the biggest issue,” he said.
The superintendent felt the brunt of the freeze. He lives in Haddock and was without water. Morgan said he is running the city wells hard now to try to replenish the supply, but that puts a strain on the system.
“We are doing all we can do,” he said. “Whether you live in the city or county, this water situation affects everyone.”
