A south Arkansas town has running water for the first time in more than eight months, but the wait for drinkable water will continue, Dallas County officials said Wednesday.
The town's only well failed July 31, which prompted a "water support mission" from the Arkansas National Guard that continued until Friday, when the new well was completed, said Lt. Col. Brian Mason, a Guard spokesman.
During the stretch, a "handful" of soldiers from the 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team transported 7.3 million gallons of water using three hauling vehicles, Mason said.
The county's emergency management director, Carry Dunn, said the next step will be to upgrade the filtration system, but there is no timetable for that.
For now, residents can flush toilets and take showers, but they won't be able to drink water from their faucets again until those improvements are made. In the meantime, the town is still under a boil order.
The well provides water to 100 meters, which provide for all of the town's 385 residents, Dunn said.
The cost of the new well was more than $900,000. Dunn said the cost was covered through grants and loans.
Originally, the process was expected to take a few months, but various obstacles extended the project, according to the county.
"Between freezing temperatures and extreme rain at the site itself, we had to spend more time on it," Dunn said. "Anything that you can imagine would hold us up did."
Additionally, the town had to purchase property next to the well site to complete the construction. Much of the grant and loan money went to that, he said.
County Judge Clark Brent said the town's entire water system needs more work. After the filtration system is fixed, the pipes that deliver the water, which were laid 57 years ago, need to be replaced because the iron-rich water has caused clogs. Additionally, he said, the water tower itself is leaking and needs an overhaul.
Plans were under way to replace the pipes when the well collapsed, Brent said.
"It was an older system and they were trying to get grants to get it fixed, but [the well] failed before it came through," Brent told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in August. "It's just a bad situation."
The covid-19 outbreak also is likely to prolong the overhaul process, according to the county. Dunn said providing a new water system for such a small town in the midst of a pandemic may mean it will "fall on the lower end of the priority list."
Brent said the National Guard's assistance "was a big relief" to the community. He guessed the soldiers hauled up to 27,000 gallons per day.
"We had three trucks running every day since this started and all three were from the Guard," he said.
Mason said the Guard alternated one tanker-trailer each week from Camp Robinson and Fort Chaffee and used two military Hippo water-hauling trucks to transport the water.
Brent said the water was collected from 5 miles away from the Tulip Princeton Water Association, which provides water service to neighboring Tulip, Lono and Willow.
Dunn confirmed that upgrading the entire water-delivery infrastructure in Carthage will probably take years.
Metro on 04/09/2020