Residents and businesses in northwest Calgary who have been struggling with a water outage since Wednesday night are continuing to find ways to stay hydrated and stay open.
Crews are working around the clock in an attempt to repair a critical water main break near Bowness that has led to city-wide water restrictions and a boil water advisory for the area. City officials say it may take days before things return to normal.
“I don’t have any clean dishes,” one resident told CityNews on Thursday. “Last night I couldn’t flush my toilet so I came to Safeway to get some water”
Bottled water has been a saving grace for the Bowness community. A water truck providing service to a local Starbucks in a Safeway grocery store has been limiting its customers to one case of water per person.
Another residents says they work at a nursing home that needs water. They spent part of their day gathering fresh water and bringing it back to the residence.
There are currently nine water wagons in Bowness for residents to access potable water. The full list of locations can be found here.
The owner of Sweet Home Bakery on Bowness Road says they have been dealing with water shortages since the early morning hours on Thursday, adding water is critical for running their business.
“Water is needed for all recipes, most if not all of them, and cleaning, which has to be done 3 times a day,” says owner Sam Moayerian.
The boil water advisory is in effect, but for businesses like Moayerian’s, it’s still not an option.
“I can’t risk it,” he says. “There is liability for us. If it’s brown I can’t use it, like I can trust it by boiling it because the colour might effect the quality.”
Pets have also been impacted by the water shortage and the Bowness Animal Hospital says working in an industry where you’re saving animals can be difficult without water. Especially when performing surgeries, says practice manager Liz Baron.
We’ve been using distilled water mainly,” she says. “For our surgeries we have to keep everything clean and sterile, and for drinking purposes the owner got some bottled water for us.”