CALEB NICKERSON
SHAWVILLE Sept. 30, 2020
Work is underway on Shawville’s water tower, which has led to some disruptions to the town’s water system. The work will repair damage to the upper panels of the tower, which were damaged by ice, as well as install a new chlorination system.
“The top three sections and the roof have damage, basically from ice,” explained Shawville councillor Bill McCleary. “When that tower was installed, they didn’t put any type of . . .
recirculation system in to prevent it from freezing on the top of the water and over the years as the water goes up and down with ice on it, it damages the panels. It’s metal lined with glass and it breaks the glass and the water can get in behind and rust things out, which is no good.”
He added that replacing the upper panels requires the lower panels to be removed, which is why residents may have noticed that the building is looking a little shorter this past week.
McCleary said that the work has caused some headaches for municipal work crews, since without the buffering effect of the tower, pressure fluctuations have led to several water main breaks around town.
“We’ve kind of solved that problem by leaving hydrants open here and there, in different locations in town so the pressure never gets too high now,” he said. “It’s probably running at a lower pressure than normal now, because the hydrants are open, but we have no choice but to do that.”
McCleary added that the disruption to the system also affected the Pontiac Community Hospital, and municipal crews had to work over the Sept. 12-13 weekend to put an emergency hookup in place.
“The other issue was, because the hospital normally is fed … almost directly from the tower, if there’s a major leak downtown, it takes water away from the hospital and once, I believe, they had to cancel dialysis,” he said. “We’ve taken some measures to prevent that from happening. We’ve tied a water line in that comes directly from the springs to the line feeding the hospital.”
He added that the line is also equipped with an emergency generator that will keep the water flowing in the event of a power outage.
“If you run out of water it’s an inconvenience, if the hospital runs out, it’s an emergency,” he said.
McCleary said that the work on the tower is expected to last for up to six weeks, and in the interim, residents are advised to bring their water to a boil for at least a minute before drinking.
“When the tower gets closer to being completed, there’s another engineering firm coming to put a chlorination system in, we never had a great chlorination system at the tower, but we’re going to have a state of the art chlorination system, and that’s one reason now why the boil advisory is on,” he explained. “There’s still a chlorine level in the water, but it’s not high enough to say ‘Go ahead and drink it’ … you have to err on the side of caution.”
