Officials: Mill Creek's orange water comes from too much iron

BLACKBERRY TOWNSHIP – Residents of the Mill Creek subdivision in Blackberry Township near Geneva reported their water was orange or tea-colored on and off for the past four weeks.

The Mill Creek Water Reclamation District is a special district that provides potable water, sanitary services and storm water management facilities to the residents and customers in the Mill Creek subdivision, according to its website, www.millcreekwrd.com. It serves about 2,000 homes, according to its website.

“This isn’t good for our laundry, our appliances, our showers/sinks and it certainly isn’t enjoyable to bathe or shower in – let alone drink – although Sheaffer has said it’s perfectly fine to do so,” according to an email from Mill Creek resident Julie Uplegger.

She was referring to Sheaffer and Roland Inc. the district’s engineer and operator.

Uplegger provided photos of the discolored water.

Jason Fowler, engineer for the Mill Creek Water Reclamation District, said the discoloration is from iron and there is no health risk to drinking it.

“This was an issue that resulted from our shallow well that ran and put more iron in the system that we typically do,” Fowler said. “Iron is naturally occurring in the well. It’s nothing that is added.”

The system has three wells. One was down for maintenance, a second one had a starting failure for about six hours, Fowler said.

The third one is shallow well that is a back-up well. High usage in the neighborhood due to lack of rain resulted in the leach of excess iron into the water system, he said.

“Any more than 0.30 milligrams per liter of iron will give you discoloration in the water,” Fowler said. “Typically what we send out is is 0.15 or lower. … On June 1, the iron level was 0.90. It was definitely elevated.”

The system has a filter for iron, but this was too much for it.

“Basically it happened in our million-gallon storage tank,” Fowler said. “Once our tank was flushed and clear, it was a matter of flushing through the system to get it clear. It happened once before. It’s a rare occurrence. It took longer to get it out of our system that we hoped. And with flushing, we did.”

With all three wells in service now and spot flushing entire neighborhoods – by opening hydrants – through this week has reduced the iron in the water to 0.10 milligrams per liter as of 5:30 a.m. Friday, Fowler said.

Residents kept getting the discolored water because it also had to flush through their water softener and water heater systems, Fowler said.

According to the Mill Creek Water Reclamation District website, Rolland and Sheaffer engineers will continue to spot flush and respond to neighborhood calls.