Umair
When officials in Richmond, Va., announced a citywide boil water advisory on Monday, residents buckled down for an unpleasant day or two. They are still buckled down.
On Wednesday, officials said that people would most likely need to keep boiling their water until at least Friday, as a disruption that began with a brief power outage at the water plant has led to a dayslong engineering challenge and a citywide relief operation.
“I know this has been an extremely trying time to not have drinking water, to not be able to shower, to not be able to wash dishes — and that, however many hours we are into this, the frustration is rising,” Mayor Danny Avula, who took office last week, said at a news conference.
The Richmond water plant serves about 227,000 customers, including residents in surrounding counties, said Dwayne Roadcap, the director of the Office of Drinking Water at the Virginia Department of Health.
People in the area were adapting this week, eating off paper plates and using baby wipes to keep clean. “I’ve been melting and collecting snow in order to flush the toilet,” said Danny Kraft, 33, who lives in the Richmond suburbs.
Mr. Kraft said he had spent the morning delivering water bottles to people who did not have private transportation. “I met a lot of people who were really panicked because they just didn’t have water,” he said, “and they had heard nothing about how they could get water.” He said he was going that afternoon to the local Jewish Community Center to take his first shower in days.
The city set up distribution sites where more than half a million bottles of water were being handed out. Tankers were bringing water to area hospitals to keep patients from having to be relocated. The National Guard has been deployed into the area with 2000-gallon trailers bringing water to isolated areas. Local Y.M.C.A.s that still have water offered showers but warned of possible waits. Richmond Public Schools have been canceled for the week.
“Job 1 is to get everything back and up and running as it’s supposed to,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin said on Wednesday afternoon at a press briefing where he provided an update on the water crisis in Richmond and discussed preparations for a storm forecast for this weekend. “While we’re at it, we need to make sure that, if there’s anything we need to do to prevent this from happening again this weekend in this next storm, the team is focused on that as well.”
Governor Youngkin was scheduled to give the annual State of the Commonwealth address at the Capitol on Wednesday when the state legislature began its session. But because of the water outage, lawmakers formally started the session and promptly recessed until next Monday, when the governor is now scheduled to give his speech.
The water crisis began on Monday morning, when the winter storm that rolled through the Mid-Atlantic region caused a power failure at Richmond’s water plant. Officials restored power before long, but the loss of power to certain critical components led to flood damage inside the facility. That afternoon the city announced a boil water advisory, saying it could be in place for a day or two, while water pressure was restored and tests were conducted.
But on Tuesday, an electrical panel failure at the plant required restarting the system again, further delaying full restoration. As of Wednesday, officials said that the water pressure in the system was steadily rising to acceptable levels and that water was finally returning to parts of the city, though they cautioned residents to continue using water sparingly and not to drink it.
Mayor Avula has promised to conduct an after-action analysis, and said that he and state officials had already been having discussions about the state of Richmond’s infrastructure.
“This whole episode has highlighted ongoing concerns about the fact that we live in an old city with an aging infrastructure,” he said, pointing out that the water plant had just marked its 100th anniversary. “So we’ve got to honestly evaluate that.”
Dina Weinstein contributed reporting from Richmond, Va.
