A number of Owen County residents still have no water at all or water pressure is very low. Some of the customers who have been restored are complaining about brown water, sediment and grit in their water and other issues. The northern half of the county is still under a boil water advisory.
This means that water is not fit for human consumption and should not be used to drink, for cooking or for washing dishes.
Representatives from the Kentucky American Water Company serving Owen County have said that they are working hard to restore full service after a water main break last Tuesday. Several other breaks were identified and repairs continue. KAWC says that the outage is due to the extremely cold weather which swept through the area for a few days.
A number of unanswered questions still remain concerning the water company's inability to deal with this clearly foreseeable event. As one of the engineers for the new treatment facility in Owen County said, cold weather is known to heave the ground and cause breaks. But the weather forecast for the below zero temperatures was made several days in advance and yet not all of the storage tanks along the main lines were filled in advance of the arrival of the cold weather.
The old Owen County water treatment plant had an output capacity of about 1.44 million gallons per day. County wide consumption has remained pretty steadily below the output capacity with actual output being a little more than half of the plants ability.
Kentucky American Water Company says it expedited the connection of its new 16 inch main from the Hardin Station plant on US 127 at the Owen/Franklin county lines to the old Owen County water plant in the midst of this "emergency" in order to meet the needs of the community.
Some county officials say a complete investigation is in order to determine the truth behind the excuses Kentucky American Water has given for the extended disruption in service which crippled the county, its people, farms and businesses for over a week.
It is hoped that the complaint filed against KAWC with the Public Services Commission will result in at least one investigation and provide some preliminary answers to the residents of Owen County.
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