GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The first round of water testing returned clean results after this weekend’s water main break in northeast Grand Rapids.
Results came in Tuesday afternoon around 1:00 p.m., with the city saying they are “a positive sign.”
The boil-water advisory remains in effect.
The advisory will be lifted after the city receives a second round of clean test results. Those are expected to be ready by Wednesday afternoon.
"Everything has been fixed. The section of pipe has been replaced. At this point, everything is back really to normal operations other than the boil-water advisory,” Wayne Jernberg, water systems manager for the city of Grand Rapids, told FOX 17 Tuesday afternoon.
“As long as the residents are boiling their water, the water will be safe.”
The advisory was issued after a water main broke near Leonard and Union Sunday.
"There was a failure on a 12-inch main that interconnects between two critical transmission mains that supply the northeast side," Jernberg explained Tuesday.
"It caused an inability for us to get water to our elevated storage facilities and other pump stations downstream."
Computers monitoring the system detected the disruption and started turning pumps off at the Livingston pump station near Belknap Lookout.
Grand Rapids City Manager Mark Washington told FOX 17 Tuesday that he would be launching an assessment of what went wrong not only in regards to infrastructure but also with the computer system.
“I think this issue is not solely the focus of the break but how the system responded to shutting off pumps in areas that are outside of the immediate area where the break was,” Washington explained Tuesday.
The city’s water system was flushed ahead of the second round of testing.
"We've been flushing mains all over the system — and we're talking hundreds of hydrants that have been flushed — to try to get anything that may be in there that could be adverse out of the system," Jernberg said.
"When we're doing that, that stirs up anything that may be in the water, ... settled in the mains or hydrant leads, or things like that, and it may also be causing some things inside the home to potentially come free as well."
Jernberg says that residents should be safe drinking water after bringing it to a rolling boil for at least a minute.
The second round of test results are expected to be in the hands of city officials by midday Wednesday.
Instructions will be sent to residents and businesses once the boil-water advisory expires.
You can visit the CDC’s website for more information about healthy drinking water.
READ MORE: Grand Rapidians grapple with boil-water advisory
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