Fuel smell drove health official out of Iqaluit water treatment plant 4 days before public was notified
Department of Health flagged concerns from residents 10 days before do-not-consume order was issued
When Wilfred Ntiamoah, a Nunavut environmental health officer, assessed Iqaluit's water treatment plant on Oct. 8, the smell of diesel was so intense he had to leave the building to get some fresh air.
That was six days after the Department of Health first began investigating public concerns over a fuel smell in Iqaluit's drinking water. It would be another four days before the City of Iqaluit told its residents stop drinking the tap water due to possible fuel contamination.
Documents obtained by CBC through an access to information request show Ntiamoah flagged what smelled like diesel at the plant — an odour Ntiamoah described as "unbearable" at times.
Using an air quality monitor from Nunavut's Department of Environment, Ntiamoah recorded "significant" levels of fumes inside the plant, which he guessed were diesel fumes. The levels dropped when he went outside. He noted that they were the worst in the facility's basement.
He suggested the city bring on a consultant to find out whether the fumes inside the plant might be contributing to the smell in the water supply.
Photos Ntiamoah provided to Nunavut health officials also included a description of one water tank inside the plant as having an "oily" surface.
In another email sent to health officials that day, Ntiamoah said he wanted to explore the issue of the fumes further and questioned why the doors to the plant were opened widely.
"Was it to dissipate built-up … diesel smell/fumes," he wrote.
Health officials flagged issue on Oct. 2
Other emails obtained by CBC show the Department of Health first began investigating the issue on Oct. 2 after residents posted to social media about the smell. Health officials met with the city about it on Oct. 3.
Between Oct. 2 and 11, the city sent out initial water samples to an Ottawa lab for testing, but the samples hadn't been collected correctly — they were put in normal plastic bottles instead of specialized glass bottles. The water had to be transferred to the right containers by the lab, and ultimately those issues meant it was difficult to interpret the lab results.
City officials told Iqaluit's 8,000 residents not to drink the tap water on Oct. 12, after complaints started flooding in about the fuel smell.
The city declared a state of emergency that same day.
Steven Siciliano, a microbiologist and toxicologist who has done research in the North, later told the Canadian Press that the human nose is "incredibly sensitive" to hydrocarbons, meaning people can smell it even if there's a very low amount.
He compared drinking the water every day for a week to smoking one or two cigarettes a day vs. smoking an entire pack a day. He said long-term exposure to compounds found in gasoline could be "very risky" but drinking it for a week probably wouldn't do much harm.
Dr. Michael Patterson, the territory's chief medical health officer, has said repeatedly that there don't seem to be any risks to residents who drank the fuel-contaminated tap water.
He's also said he wants to be 100 per cent certain the water is safe to drink before lifting the do-not-consume order.
With files from Nick Murray