{"id":303070,"date":"2021-09-08T10:45:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-08T10:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grist.org\/?p=545403"},"modified":"2021-09-08T10:45:00","modified_gmt":"2021-09-08T10:45:00","slug":"ida-left-behind-a-water-crisis-in-the-gulf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/09\/08\/ida-left-behind-a-water-crisis-in-the-gulf\/","title":{"rendered":"Ida left behind a water crisis in the Gulf"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
It has been a week and a half since Hurricane Ida hit the Gulf Coast and the devastating impacts of the Category 4 storm are still being felt throughout the region. Some 418,000 people in Louisiana remain without power<\/a>, unable to run air conditioning units to deal with scorching late summer temperatures<\/a> or keep food fresh in homes and grocery stores. The storm has also forced hundreds of municipal water systems offline, creating a drinking water crisis that officials warn could last weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As of Tuesday, 51 water systems across Louisiana, each serving between 25 to 20,000 people, remained shut down due to Ida. Another 242 remained under boil water advisories. Around 642,000 people remain without access to clean water, according to<\/a> the Louisiana Department of Health. In Mississippi, the state Department of Health has 10 active boiling water notices<\/a>, affecting 7,142 people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere is no particular timeframe for all systems to come back up to 100 percent,\u201d Kevin Litter, a spokesperson for Louisiana Department of Health, said in an email. \u201cThis will be different for every system and also based on location.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The reasons for the immediate water crisis are two-fold: Across Louisiana and Mississippi, Hurricane Ida ripped down power lines, leaving water systems unable to get the electricity they needed to pump groundwater or to run treatment facilities. Even though Louisiana mandates that all water systems have backup, fuel-powered generators, many don\u2019t comply with the rule, Litter explained. Those who do have backup pumps are being affected by the extended blackout still crippling parts of the Gulf a week post-storm — a situation that has created fuel shortages that leave generators useless. Flooding on roads can also leave critical infrastructure, like water wells or pump stations, out of reach, making it impossible to fix storm damage. Lastly, the destruction of roads and bridges has literally ripped apart water pipelines, disrupting the whole system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Intensified by climate change, Hurricane Ida is one of the strongest storms on record to hit the Gulf Coast. But the 150-mile-per-hour winds that took down electric lines, trees, and homes, as well as the powerful storm surge that briefly reversed the flow of the Mississippi River, can\u2019t fully explain the state\u2019s water systems failures. <\/p>\n\n\n\n