Drinking Water

Traces of a hazardous chemical have turned up in three wells that provide drinking water to the city of Aberdeen, test results released yesterday by Aberdeen Proving Ground show. In June, perchlorate was detected in one of 11 city wells around the base's perimeter. The chemical did not reappear in that well when water was tested July 23, but it was detected in three others, said Pat McClung, APG spokeswoman. City Manager Peter A. Dacey said "there's no need for alarm," because the perchlorate appeared at low levels - between 1.2 and 1.7 parts per billion.

Maryland is fortunate to have many beautiful parks, rivers and streams, breathtaking views, delicious fish and shellfish and enjoyable recreational opportunities, from our nation's largest estuary to the snow-capped mountains in Western Maryland. Throughout our history, we have not done enough to protect these treasures and the water that links them, allowing them to deteriorate and their ecosystems to suffer. Under Gov.Martin O'Malley's leadership, though, things have started to turn around.

The answer to the above question is: yes, by and large. But a new report by the Natural Resources Defense Council, a private environmental watchdog organization in Washington, warns that public water systems nationwide contain enough contaminants to cause more than 900,000 illnesses annually. More alarming, 900 people may die from waterborne diseases each year, the NRDC says.Concerns about public water two decades ago led Congress to pass the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974. The legislation called for the nation's 200,000 local water systems to be regulated by the federal and state governments.

The following letter was sent to local elected officials and a copy was provided for publication. Regarding the Columbia Gas Transmission Line, Referred to as the Line MB Loop, I am writing to you with safety, environmental and home value concerns relative to the above proposed line. Columbia Gas Transmission is either unwilling or has not authorized representatives to answer any of our hard questions. The issues as we see it are as follows: There is an existing eight-inch non pressurized line approximately 150 yards from our house.

Residents of the Baltimore metropolitan area like the taste of their drinking water, but most fear that the quality of that water is in jeopardy, according to a poll conducted for the Reservoir Watershed Protection Program.Local residents had considerably more confidence in their drinking water than did Americans nationwide.In the local survey, conducted in May and June and released last week, 79 percent of 861 residents who live in the watersheds of the area's three reservoirs -- Liberty, Prettyboy and Loch Raven, all operated by Baltimore -- rated their drinking water excellent to good.

The lower Susquehanna River has been as much as 13 times saltier than normal, prompting a health alert urging some residents of the Havre de Grace area whose drinking water comes from the river to use bottled water instead.The low water level in the normally freshwater Susquehanna, resulting from drought conditions, is causing salt water from the Chesapeake Bay to back up into the river.That, Havre de Grace officials say, is leading to unusually high levels of salt in the drinking water of the old riverfront town and surrounding communities.

WASHINGTON -- Eight years after it voted to drastically tighten the purity standards for tap water, the Senate decided yesterday that it had overreached and voted 95-3 to loosen them again.Whether the Senate's changes, made to the Safe Drinking Water Act, would actually increase the existing, tiny risks of drinking tap water was in some dispute.Environmental groups called the vote a victory for the pesticide lobby and for financially strapped water companies.The senators, in turn, argued that the current law was so draconian that no one had been able to meet all its dictates anyway, including the Environmental Protection Agency, which has the responsibility to enforce the law."

Many Americans thought tap water could make them ill only if they traveled to some Third World countries.Then in April, thousands of Milwaukee-area residents came down with diarrhea, abdominal pains and vomiting. At first it was thought to be a flu outbreak. Laboratory tests eventually detected a waterborne parasite in the city's water supply, which comes from Lake Michigan.By the time Milwaukee's water was declared safe again, an estimated 370,000 people had been made sick by drinking water contaminated with the parasite, cryptosporidium.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Unhealthy levels of pesticides and nitrates are believed to be contaminating wells that provide drinking water for hundreds of communities, the Environmental Protection Agency said yesterday.EPA officials emphasized that a nationwide sampling of wells indicated that fewer than 1 percent are contaminated to levels that are of concern.But those wells provide drinking water for millions of people, the officials said.While the "vast majority" of the country's drinking water wells don't pose a risk to public health, the findings provide an "early warning sign that this needs to be taken seriously," said Henry Habicht, the EPA's deputy administrator.

Maryland farmers will be asked this year to reduce their use of a popular but toxic weed killer that is showing up in drinking water and Chesapeake Bay, state agriculture officials say.The Maryland Department of Agriculture, which regulates farm chemicals, is preparing voluntary guidelines for farmers on how they can cut back application of the herbicide atrazine.The guidelines are being drafted with the help of Ciba-Geigy Corp., the chemical's leading producer. The firm has proposed nationwide restrictions on atrazine and educational programs such as the one planned in Maryland to try to reduce contamination.

In recent years, the natural gas industry plunged into a reckless gold rush across communities nationwide with dirty, dangerous drilling and "fracking" practices that are exempt from many clean air and water laws. Now the gas profiteers have realized that there's even more money to be made by liquefying the gas and shipping it overseas - and so what if that sends gas prices here at home through the roof? The proposed Dominion LNG export facility in Calvert County's Cove Point provides a good case study of why this practice is bad for the environment, for people and for our nation's fragile economy.

When the second watershed cleanup in four weeks takes place this Saturday and Sunday at Rocky Gorge Reservoir, equestrians who have been prohibited from riding on horseback trails since May will again be working to clear the very access roads to which they were banned. Volunteers say they remain eager to help the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission patrol and maintain the land that buffers the drinking water supply, even as they fight to regain use of the trails. Yet, they are feeling "very conflicted" by WSSC's Nov. 16 verbal decree that violators will receive warnings instead of citations despite posted rules to the contrary.

Baltimore city health officials have confirmed two cases of legionnaires disease at a Hampden nursing home. The two people diagnosed with the disease at the Keswick Multi-Care Center on West 40th Street began showing symptoms in September but are recovering, according to Brian Schleter, a spokesman with the Baltimore Health Department. The center is taking precautions by serving only bottled water while an investigation is under way. Legionnaires is caused by a bacterium called legionella.

A practice that separates people from creatures of lesser mental capacity is having the good sense not to befoul with waste the places where we eat. Though some of us fail to understand the importance of this concept when it comes to certain figurative situations, in literal situations, almost no one has a problem keeping the functions separate. Strangely, while keeping our food sources free of contamination is something we all attach a high priority to when it comes to our personal needs, there are times when this simple necessity of civilized behavior isn't afforded to those around us. In decades past in this country, the practice of disposing of waste by dumping it into a flowing river was considered acceptable, even though it would then become the problem of the people living downstream.

Commentator Bishop Harry R. Jackson Jr.'s arguments in favor of shale oil drilling are deeply flawed ("Fracking: Don't let fear hold us back," Oct. 12). After a summer of record flooding, we are entitled to a healthy fear of what gets flushed from old wells, industrial sites and waste water holding pits. More to the point, hydraulic fracturing to extract shale oil and gas is a frightening health threat. Dr. Walter Tsou, past president of the American Public Health Association, told the Philadelphia City Council that "politicians have explicitly avoided the public health question because if they were really confronted with it, they would stop hydraulic fracturing.

This week, Watchdog updates readers about an unresolved problem. Update: The fountain in the Druid Hill Park reservoir is going to remain out of commission for the time being. Watchdog last updated the condition of the landmark in 2009, explaining that phragmites, an invasive water plant, had clogged the fountain's lines. At the time, officials with Baltimore's Department of Public Works had planned to have the fountain restored to working order in 2010. But more than two years have passed, and nothing has changed.

WASHINGTON - The drinking water on more than one of every eight passenger airliners tested by the Environmental Protection Agency flunked the agency's standards for bacteria, the government said yesterday. EPA officials said they had no evidence that passengers had gotten sick from the water. But the agency said in a statement: "Passengers with compromised immune systems or others concerned (about the safety of the water) may want to request canned or bottled beverages." Representatives of the leading airline industry trade group said they were confident that airline water was safe.

Temperatures hung in the 90s, the area's worst drought in more than a century continued without relief - but the Anne Arundel County Fire Department got a worse-than-tepid response yesterday to its offer of free drinking water for those whose wells are running dry. As of late yesterday, firefighters at the Riva and West Annapolis stations - both in areas where residents report problems with their wells - said no one had stopped by asking for water....

During a break in the action, my son's friend came into the kitchen, glass in hand, seeking some water to drink. He looked at the refrigerator door - but saw no dispenser there. He turned toward a corner where a water cooler might be, but saw no dispenser there. A bit confused, he scanned the room, glass still in hand, looking for something, anything, that resembled a spigot from which drinking water might flow. Finally, defeated, he asked me where, please, he might find some water.