MERRILL — Bill Selles picked a bad time to
plant a lawn.Selles, who lives in
Merrill, put in the grass earlier this week. But after the
city’s water supply ran dry shortly after midnight
Wednesday, he’s not sure if his new lawn will make it.
That’s an inconvenience. Having water for
drinking and cooking is another matter.
That’s why Bill Heinrich, co-owner of B&D
Mobile Support of Klamath Falls, got a call at 1:30 a.m. His
company, which was called to help after Hurricane Katrina
and has worked at several forest fires and disasters,
provided two water tankers, one filled with 2,000 gallons of
water and one with 3,500.
Heinrich was stationed at Merrill
Elementary School and his partner, Dave Jensen, parked at
Merrill City Hall. The tankers filled at fire hydrants in
Malin, then drove to Merrill. Jensen refilled his truck late
that afternoon, and said the trucks likely would remain in
the town through the night.
Helping out
“Everybody’s helping everybody,” Jensen
said. “Some people have been here eight to 10 times, helping
neighbors.”
Just how long Merrill will be without
water is uncertain.
Bob Bunyard, of the Klamath Pump Center,
was called to help at 1 a.m.
“I told them there was nothing I could do,
you guys are out of water,” Bunyard said. “I can’t pull a
rabbit out of a hat.”
Bunyard said the outage resulted because
the water level at the city well dropped. The pump was at a
depth of 70 feet, but he said it will be lowered another 40
feet.
Bunyard said it’s hoped the shaft to
extend the pump deeper will arrive today and be installed by
Friday afternoon.
Throughout the day Wednesday, Heinrich and
volunteer Nate Hughes filled all sorts and sizes of
containers — from tubs to bottles — for people like Selles.
“I turned my water on last night and there
wasn’t any,” Selles said. “I searched all the pipe for a
break and I didn’t find one.”
Selles and others learned about the
outage, some by calling the Merrill Water Department, some
by the city police
Merrill out of water
Without water, residents are making do
Tankers parked at elementary school, city hall providing
water to residents
By
LEE JUILLERAT and SARA HOTTMAN, Herald and News 7/1/10
H&N
photo by Andrew Mariman Mikey Gardner, with Klamath
Pump Center, works on Merrill’ city well Wednesday after
the town lost its domestic water due to a drop in the
well’s water level.
MERRILL — Bill
Selles picked a bad time to plant a lawn.
Selles, who lives in
Merrill, put in the grass earlier this week. But after
the city’s water supply ran dry shortly after midnight
Wednesday, he’s not sure if his new lawn will make it.
That’s an
inconvenience. Having water for drinking and cooking is
another matter.
That’s why Bill
Heinrich, coowner of B&D Mobile Support of Klamath
Falls, got a call at 1:30 a.m. His company, which was
called to help after Hurricane Katrina and has worked at
several forest fires and disasters, provided two water
tankers, one filled with 2,000 gallons of water and one
with 3,500.
Heinrich was
stationed at Merrill Elementary School and his partner,
Dave Jensen, parked at Merrill City Hall. The tankers
filled at fire hydrants in Malin, then drove to Merrill.
Jensen refilled his truck late that afternoon, and said
the trucks likely would remain in the town through the
night.
Helping out
“Everybody’s helping
everybody,” Jensen said. “Some people have been here
eight to 10 times, helping neighbors.” Just how long
Merrill will be without water is uncertain. Bob Bunyard,
of the Klamath Pump Center, was called to help at 1 a.m.
“I told them there was nothing I could do, you guys are
out of water,” Bunyard said. “I can’t pull
a rabbit out of a hat.”
Bunyard said the
outage resulted because the water level at the city well
dropped. The pump was at a depth of 70 feet, but he said
it will be lowered another 40 feet.
Bunyard said it’s
hoped the shaft to extend the pump deeper will arrive
today and be installed by Friday afternoon.
Throughout the day
Wednesday,
Heinrich and volunteer Nate Hughes filled all sorts and
sizes of containers — from tubs to bottles — for people
like Selles.
“I turned my water
on last night and there wasn’t any,” Selles said. “I
searched all the pipe for a break and I didn’t find
one.”
Selles and others
learned about the outage, some by calling the Merrill
Water Department,
some by the city police.
No morning coffee
Diane Meyer learned
Wednesday morning while trying to make a pot of coffee
for her husband, Ed, and seeking fresh water for her
dogs. The Meyers were among the steady line of people
who filled containers.
“Everybody’s pretty
much calm,” Heinrich said of water seekers.
During some free
time, Hughes calculated the two huge containers had
401,280 ounces of water.
Sharon Cosand
planned to use her ounces for her house.
Unlike others who
went without showers — “You might not want to come too
close. I haven’t had a shower,” said Bev Coffman,
another Merrill resident — Cosand went to her parents’
house outside of town and showered.
Pappy Gander
restaurant served canned sodas Wednesday afternoon
because its fountain soda dispensers use water, said
Megan McDougal, a part-owner. The restaurant used water
trucked in from Malin to wash dishes, and was serving
bottled water it had on hand.
Martin’s Food Center
stopped cutting meat because there was no hot water to
clean with, and owner Martin Hicks said bottled water
was selling steadily throughout the day. By 3:30 p.m.,
he said, the shelf was full but the stock room was
empty.
“We had one gal come
in this morning and say, ‘One case of water ought to be
good for one shower,’ ” he said.
Later that afternoon
the store was mostly empty, and only Doug Mann of Malin
was stocking up on gallon jugs of water. He said he
normally buys five-gallon jugs, but the store was out.
Flats of smaller bottles of water appeared to be mostly
stocked, though there were only five-gallon jugs still
on the shelf.
