Yellowknife boil water advisory hits milestone
No word on when advisory will be lifted for Yellowknife, Ndilo, and Dettah
The boil water advisory in Yellowknife has hit a milestone: as of yesterday, May 26, it's now the longest one the N.W.T. capital has seen in at least two decades.
The advisory was issued on May 11. Residents of Yellowknife, Ndilo, and Dettah are being asked to boil their water for at least one minute prior to drinking.
Dr. Andre Corriveau, the Northwest Territories' chief public health officer, has stated that the advisory is due to increased turbidity, or muddy water, related to low water levels in the Yellowknife River, and is only precautionary.
Though many other N.W.T. communities have had significantly longer boil water advisories — Sachs Harbour has had two in the past seven years that have lasted at least six months — the length of the current advisory is new for most Yellowknife residents. It's only the second advisory for the capital in the last two decades, and the previous one, issued in 2004, lasted 15 days.
As of today, the current advisory has lasted 17 days.
There's still no word when the boil water advisory will be lifted. Residents of Yellowknife, Ndilo and Dettah are being asked to boil all water for at least one minute.
That includes water used for:
- drinking
- preparing hot food
- hot and cold beverages
- ice cubes
- washing fruits and vegetables
- brushing teeth.
Residents are also being warned against relying on carbon filters, which Corriveau has said "do not disinfect the water."
Yellowknife's new $32.5 million water treatment plant, scheduled to go into operation in the second part of June, will use a series of filters to remove sediment before water is treated for any harmful bacteria.