[DIV class=feed_details] [H4] [DIV class=feed_details] [H2]Heres the info in the sun[/H2] [H2] [/H2] [H2][A href="vny!://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=1a7ba53c-7275-434f-90c1-43bc209417c2"]vny!://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=1a7ba53c-7275-434f-90c1-43bc209417c2[/A][/H2] [H2] [/H2] [H2]Two million told: Don't drink the water[/H2] [H4]Advisory is one of the largest tap-water warnings in B.C. history[/H4][/DIV][/H4]
[DIV class=para12 id=article] One of the largest water warnings in the province's history was issued Thursday for Greater Vancouver's two million residents after torrential rains triggered dozens of landslides into the region's reservoirs, turning tap water cloudy and brown.
Hospitals, daycares and schools were ordered to boil tap water or use bottled water. Other residents were advised to boil tap water or use bottled water.
"I think they should be concerned with the level of turbidity," Vancouver medical health officer Patricia Daly told a news conference.
"Having said that, it's their choice. But if they ask my opinion, they shouldn't be drinking water from the taps with turbidity levels this high."
Daly said the boil-water order would be extended to the public only if there was evidence of contamination in the drinking water, or evidence that it is causing illness in the population "and we don't have that at the present time."
However, she said periods of high turbidity in drinking water are often followed by higher levels of gastrointestinal illnesses because chlorine is less effective at killing harmful organisms when they are coated with silt.
The turbidity level -- the amount of sediment in the water -- "is the worst they've seen, ever," Vancouver Health Authority spokeswoman Viviana Zanocco said earlier.
Greater Vancouver Regional District water manager Paul Archibald said it was the first such advisory in the 20 years he has been with the district.
He said he had seen turbidity levels as high or higher once before, during the 1990s, but no health advisory was issued then.
Provincial public health officer Dr. Perry Kendall said the advisory is "probably one of the larger ones in recent history."
Daly could not say whether home-filtering systems can clean out organisms in the water.
"We can't guarantee that those devices are going to work," she said, adding that people should check with their manufacturers.
"If people are concerned about the water, our advice is to drink bottled water or to boil their water for one minute," she said.
Turbidity levels started going up late Wednesday afternoon as a major rainstorm lashed coastal communities, said the GVRD's Archibald.
By Thursday morning, the turbidity was 90 times the target level in one of the region's three North Shore reservoirs, and 70 times the target level in another.
However, by Thursday afternoon those levels had dropped by nearly half, said Johnny Carline, the district's water commissioner.
Carline said the turbidity was the result of dozens of landslides into the reservoirs, but fresh water coming in from streams that feed the reservoirs is much cleaner.
"We're trying to spill as much water from those reservoirs as we can to get rid of the muddy water and replace it with clean water," he said.
Turbidity is measured in NTUs -- nephelometric turbidity units, based on the amount of light reflected off particles in the water. The recommended level for tap water is one NTU, and five NTUs triggers an advisory from the water district.
Thursday morning, the water from Seymour reservoir hit 90 NTUs and Capilano water 70 NTUs. The Coquitlam reservoir, whose shores are more gravelly, got no higher than six to seven NTUs.
Between 60 and 65 per cent of the region's water currently comes from the Coquitlam reservoir, 15 per cent from Seymour and the rest from Capilano.
Carline said the tap water was murkiest on the North Shore, around downtown Vancouver and as far south as the Little Mountain area and east to central Burnaby. The rest of the region should be getting relatively clean water from the Coquitlam reservoir.
However, he warned that there can be enough silt in tap water to create health concerns even if the water isn't visibly turbid.
Daly said health authorities will monitor turbidity levels daily and will withdraw the boil-water advisory if they fall far enough.
However, Carline warned: "We all know there is another storm forecast for Sunday, and so we'll have to sit and wait and see what the impact of that is."
Thursday's advisory was issued by the water district on the advice of the coastal and Fraser health authorities.
Archibald said the slides were triggered by 150 millimetres of rain falling into the watersheds over about 15 hours, after the soil had been saturated by earlier rainstorms.
"When you have those kinds of conditions, something is bound to give way and in this case it was a number of slides."
The water district "significantly" increased the amount of chlorine it uses to treat the water. But Daly said residents shouldn't be concerned about high chlorine levels because most of it dissipates by the time it comes out of their taps.
Health care facilities, daycares and schools are now required to use bottled water or boil water for at least a full minute, for drinking, brushing teeth or washing fruit and vegetables, Daly said.
It can be used for cooking as long as it is boiled, she said. "It's also safe for hand-washing, for bathing, dishwashing is fine and laundry use is fine."
The health advisory made getting a cup of coffee in the normally j-ava-rich city harder than usual Thursday.
Scott Coburn, spokesman for Marketplace IGA, said the grocery chain decided to stop serving coffee and tea in its in-store cafes shortly after noon Thursday "just out a sense of precaution." Stores were also advised throughout the Lower Mainland to turn off the water sprinklers in the produce department and remove food from ice displays.
At the same time, Coburn said, bottled water sales "are going crazy right now."
The coffee pot remained on at Turk's Coffee Exchange on Commercial Drive, though owner Linda Turko took tea off the menu Thursday "just to be on the safe side."
Turko said water used in her coffee and coffee-based drinks is all filtered through a "heavy-duty commercial-type filter" before ending up in customer's cups, and felt confident in its safety.
Some Starbucks locations stopped serving coffee and tea temporarily Thursday, but later resumed full service.
Glenn Pepperell, owner of Knot Just Bagels in downtown Vancouver, also stopped selling tea, coffee and coffee-based drinks for a while, but resumed when he heard other businesses were continuing to sell hot drinks.
"I think someone just pulled the panic alarm," he said.
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