Holy crap! Literally! And environmentalists wonder why bottled water is so popular.
Otay officials investigate water foul-up
Otay Water District officials spent the day yesterday trying to determine how a Chula Vista business park had treated sewage flowing from its water taps for two years, and how to ensure it doesn’t happen anywhere else.
“We thought we had a good process,” said Mark Watton, Otay’s general manager. “Obviously, there’s a gap.”
The 17 stores at Fenton Business Center in Eastlake were ordered Friday not to drink or wash their hands with tap water after tests from a private lab showed they were getting recycled water, or treated sewage, instead of drinkable water.
“Otay”??
“Hey Buckwheat, hold this for me!”
I think I heard something along the same lines a few weeks ago on Olbermann. Some place, they had hooked up the plumbing incorrectly, and the water for the homes to drink, was hooked up to their sprinklers for their lawns, and visa versa.
It ends up that the guy in CA here took a $5k bribe to overlook some contractor’s work. Is that all it costs. Geeze, some people come cheap.
This is what pisses me off:
From the linked article:
Obviously, there’s a gap.”
Ya think??!!?
As for bottled water though, why assume it’s better? At least in most places, tap water is regularly tested. Bottled spring water need not be.
What it means to be from Maine … less deer pee … more moose pee.
#4 What the wackos are bitching about now is that much bottled water IS tap water that has been additionally purified. The wackos in question want the practice either outlawed or have a bigger notice that the water comes from municipal water supplies.
Here in the Hudson River region, they are trying to get the water cleaned up. It is said that Henry Hudson and his crew could stand in the water up to their chins and see their toes at the bottom, but when I was a kid during the ’50’s, swimming in it was a no-no… the river and all its tributaries were turbid brown open sewers. There’s been a long controversy about who did the most polluting… the General Electric company has taken a lot of flak for their PCB contamination of river sediments and whatnot, which is probably true enough, but the discharge of municipal runoff and treatment plant drains of small riverside cities (not to mention ‘grandfathered’ private cesspools and the like) will probably keep it brown for some time to come. Welcome to the club…
Mmmmm, poopliquid is the best flavoring…
“Chula Vista” translates to “Don’t forget to put the seat down.”
Delicious
The Romans got running water right and we’re having trouble?
#8, >>“Chula Vista” translates to “Don’t forget to put the seat down.”
Is that like “La Quinta” translates to “next to Denny’s?”
So, my upper decker’s aren’t going to waste after all.
#6, pterocat,
I don’t think so.
A healthy ecosystem is rarely that clear. If it is, that means there are no small organisms in the water, stuff the bigger organisms like to eat, which in turn feed the vertebrates.
Suspended solid are usually indicative of poor farming practices or an unusual high rainfall.
Goes hand and hand with this story
http://tinyurl.com/2g99vj
I do not know what process this company was using but there should not have been any coliform bacteria in that water. This is not acceptable by awwa standards. It would not have been considered safe for irrigation or body contact . As for tap water. no matter how clean it is coming out of the plant, where most tests are made, it still goes through a lot of pipes with a lot of contaminants getting to your house.
Almost as bad as bong water.
Everyone in China has a water cooler in their home and at work – that’s a given.
What you have to be very careful about is the supplier of the water for the cooler, as more often then not it is just unfiltered tap water which is generally not potable and I would not even cook with it.*
Chinese news reported recently that about 50% of bottled water sold in China is counterfeit water** – and admitted that the real figure could be much higher. The government stresses that consumers need to be careful of whom they buy their water from and to report any vendor suspected of selling counterfeit water.
*One of our partner companies manufactures pigments for cosmetics and so must pass heavy metal tests EU Commission Directive 95/45/EC-171. The heavy metal content varied so widely we could not figure out why as all of the materials used did not, and then the obvious – its the water! We used filtered water for our processes and day to day the heavy metal content would fluctuate. So now we tank in de-ionized water (Distilled) for any process where heavy metals must be low (testing that as well). Therefore cooking rice with tap water means that rice would not pass heavy metal content tests… Hmmmm
**Counterfeit water is water sold as a well know brand which may not be safe to drink – tap water or unfiltered tap water and heavy metals.
So when in China IMHO drink distilled bottle water like Watson’s Water (HK) or Nestle’s only from well known chain convenience stores (Lawsons, All Days etc) and supermarkets as you never know what the private shops are selling.
Cheers
Minneapolis (home sweet fallen-bridge home) implemented one of the best water treatment plants in the world a few years ago. Since then, the county has repeatedly (6-8 times, maybe more) flushed the system with something that makes all the rust and other gunk come out of the taps. Each time this was done, I would have to turn the water on for a few minutes before it would run clear. Occasionally, I’d flush the toilet, and the bowl water would look worse than what was in there!
However, now my tap water (in an apartment) is so clean and clear that it’s tasteless – it’s BLAND!! There is no salt, fish, iron, or any other detectable taste in it – it’s just very clean water. I can optionally run it through a reverse-osmosis filter I installed myself.
#18 “…flush the toilet, and the bowl water would look worse than what was in there!”
My wife and were wondering about that! We were in St Paul for a while in 2005. We’d go to CUB for the filtered water anyway so we never tried drinking TAP. Well with the taxes in MN I guess the have to do something.
There you go – another mystery solved at DU!
Cheers
#14 – gquaglia,
That’s a pretty bad mix-up. At least they don’t flush their toilets with potable drinking water though. Here in the U.S. we truly fail to appreciate what a precious resource fresh drinking water is. We probably shock large parts of the world, or would if they knew, that we us fresh potable drinking water for all of:
Flushing out toilets
Showering
Watering our stupid lawns (yeah lawns are a really bad thing)
Washing our cars
Hosing down our sidewalks
Then, with all the good cheap public drinking water we have and waste, we buy bottled water, thus wasting fuel to truck the shit to us, more fuel to truck the garbage away, and adding more plastic for our land fills.
There really is something seriously wrong with people in the U.S.
(Note, I didn’t say Americans to avoid pissing off Canadians, Mexicans, Central Americans, and South Americans, all of whom are also Americans, though USians think that we’re the only Americans. Just another bit of U.S. silliness.)
#20 “Note, I didn’t say Americans to avoid pissing off…”
Well almost correct. Only the following are acceptable for the country name and nationality. (But I am not being bitchy – read on….)
Conventional long form: United States of America
Conventional short form: United States
Abbreviation: US or USA
‘America’ is not acceptable as the country name. (I’m guilty of that)
Only the following are accepted for nationality:
Noun: American(s)
Adjective: American
But in the spirit of political correctness in which you have endeavoured to employ lets take it to the next level.
If China is the correct country name then Chinese is the nationality. Russia = Russians and one that no one ever knows – Isle of Man = Manxman (men), and Manxwoman (women) adjective: Manx (WTF?)
To be called Americans while America is only one country in the Americas, Americans ought not be called Americans any more.
If I might suggest the new PC nationality for the USA
Statian, or Statians or Usish, Uushes- and lastly Statiode, Statiods.
Why not try out our new nationalities and see how they fit?
My fellow Statians – (Hmmm could work) : /
My fellow Uushes…(Nah – not good) 🙁
My fellow Statiods – (We got a Winner!!) 😀
Cheers
I like the carafe water with ice cubes the fancy hotels offer in Asia. Stayed in late one morning and the maid filled up the carafe from the bathroom sink and added the ice from a bucket in her carte. Glad I have an iron stomach.
Speaking of which, in the various articles I’ve seen about crossed pipes, seems no one really gets sick==course the kiddies get upset stomachs, nothing to do with Big Macs for dinner.
GOUSA could save alot of water with some simple water re-use==and strict enforcement of color coded pipes?
#22 – bobbo,
I like the idea of the color coded pipes. Cool.
Having traveled to much of the third world, I can say quite strongly. Open the bottle yourself. No ice. And, if you wouldn’t drink it, don’t brush your teeth with it.
Carafes either in restaurants, hotel rooms, or hotel restaurants are generally suspect. If it has no ice in it, but the carafe is sweating, it had ice in it. So, even if they filled it from their water cooler (generally OK, though not as reliable as bottles), if the carafe is actively sweating, don’t drink it.
Money saving tip for third world travel: If driving yourself around, buy a 5 gallon jug in a store near the airport, pay the deposit, fill your own travel bottles from that. Replace as necessary, either giving back the first one for the deposit on the second or, if different brand than is sold there, buy new, pour into old. Give back new. Return jug prior to departure near airport.
Even if you can’t return the bottle to get your deposit back, you’ll save a significant amount of money and reduce your plastic waste considerably.
Treated water in California meets or exceeds drinking standards, it is just not acceptable in our minds that we could be drinking such a thing. Most treated water, although it is perfectly OK, ends up being pumped into the ocean.
I’m not saying that they should just reuse it as regular water, but going bonkers over having drank some of the stuff is just a sign of ignorance.
23–Scott, I missed something==how do you get water into your 5 gallon jug? I’ve found it easier just to drink the local water. I get sick maybe every third year, but it only lasts 3-5 days. Makes me feel like “a warrior.” Aint afraid of no water, nor cut fruit neither.
The old travel hint was to drink nothing but coke or beer and to brush teeth in the same. Beer being often cheaper than coke.
And for Tihz==I think boiling water to make tea, and tea is all most chinese drink, has alot more than taste issues driving that practice?
#25 – bobbo,
When traveling to countries without potable tap water, I buy the 5 gallon jug. I use that water for all drinking and toothbrushing. It’s not a way to avoid bottled water. That doesn’t exist in large parts of the world. It’s a way to avoid creating as much waste and save some money. I’m not willing to ruin my vacation by getting sick. India, South and Central America, Africa, and many other locations do not have drinking water in the taps. And, some illnesses and parasites are much worse than you describe.
That said, if I’m at a high end lodge and they tell me the water is safe, I drink it. I was fine that way in Panama. Some camps in the Okavango delta get their water from the delta, which is already a better filtration system than any dreamed up by humans, so the water is safe.
But, mostly, I drink bottled water in developing nations. And, I try to do it as economically and ecologically soundly as possible.
Another good option would be a camping water filter and a UV treatment device. That would get the water clean and virus free.
As an old Boy Scout, I used to use water purification tablets. More info from Princeton Univ. here:
http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/manual/water.shtml
Even iced tea isn’t immune (scary news from last year in TX):
CBS11 News Investigates: What’s In Your Iced Tea?
http://cbs11tv.com/investigators/local_story_144175446.html
Yuck! I’ll have a Guinness.
“No ice. And, if you wouldn’t drink it, don’t brush your teeth with it.”
I had a friend who was paranoid about this in Indonesia and would brush his teeth with Whisky, and used it as a mouth wash as well. I maintained it wasn’t about the hygiene… 😉
A good general rule, add – soft drinks only from cans or bottles. 😉
Restaurants and bars use tap water to mix with the soft drink syrup. Filters which remove biological contamination in soft drink dispensers and ice makers are used in countries where TAP water is not potable. But the heavy metals are a worry in the many parts of China and the maintenance on the filters and equipment.
I have an upcoming trip to India next month and I have been warned that NO MATTER what I do I will have an anal aerobic workout. I heard so much shit about India about their shit and I hate forming a negative opinion before I go.
Anyone had a trip to India and came back with bowels intact?
Cheers
#28 I have always heard that restaurant ice tea was full of germs. As for the Guinness, that why beer was first brewed, the water back then was so bad, that beer was actually safer.