‘Operational error’ blamed for water crisis

Thursday’s water crisis in far north Fort Worth was a deep embarrassment for the city, another failure to properly serve residents of that fast-growing area.

An estimated 3,500 to 5,000 water customers who live southwest of Alliance Airport, west of Haslet and both north and south of U.S. 287 were told to boil tap water before drinking it, cooking with it or making ice.

That’s no small problem for people in their homes. It was also a problem for six Northwest district schools in the affected area: a high school, a middle school and four elementary schools.

Fortunately, emergency response was great. The city was quick in notifying residents and made bottled water available at several locations. Pepsi, Kroger, Walgreens and iOffice donated bottled water to Northwest ISD, and students were served meals of prepackaged food.

The city blamed an “operational error” for potential contamination of water in service lines. That sounds like a city employee made a really bad mistake.

Whatever it was, about 7:30 p.m. Wednesday it “led to the draining of the Bradley elevated water tank on Harmon Road, which resulted in the pressure dropping below 20 pounds per square inch in some areas.”

The pressure drop lasted only about 10 minutes, said city spokeswoman Mary Gugliuzza. But low pressure means there is a danger that contaminants entered the water system.

The boil-water notice was required by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. It won’t be lifted until contamination testing is completed, Friday morning at the earliest.

Far north Fort Worth has attracted a huge share of the city’s booming growth in recent years. When portions of that area are annexed to the city, it’s with the promise and expectation that city services will be provided.

Mistakes can happen anywhere.

This one draws a lot of attention because clean water is a fundamental necessity — and because residents of that part of Fort Worth have long complained about such things as slow police response times and inadequate roads.

Explanations will be in order once clean water is flowing through the pipes again.

Why, for example, didn’t redundant policies and procedures prevent an “operational error” of such magnitude?

This story was originally published February 4, 2016 at 5:43 PM with the headline "‘Operational error’ blamed for water crisis."