On December 26 a message was sent to the community stating our water pump was not working and residents should conserve water. The water conservation request was lifted on January 7. Since then, we have received questions about what happened, why the delays in repairs, and what is being done to mitigate the risks of similar situations in the future. These are all reasonable questions, and the CMCC board would like to provide the community with a little more information:

In immediate response to the outage notification, some of our volunteer board members, who are skilled and experienced in operating our water system, began working to diagnose and call in the proper support for what was believed to be the cause of the outage: one pump motor would not operate under a full load.

On December 27, Aquatec supplied CMCC with a technician familiar with our system. In the course of the diagnosis, he found the air relief valve at pump station 2 was stuck. He concurred with with our volunteers that the pump seemed to have failed. At that point, CMCC ordered another pump.

Meanwhile, CMCC continued to troubleshoot other components including the control panel and the communication between components which was not functioning properly.

The following day, Process Solutions came to look at the control panel; they originally installed it and were familiar with it. Our system can be configured in many different ways depending on the requirements for individual water systems. Techs determined it needed to be reconfigured to better accommodate power failures. They reprogrammed it to allow the pumps to start up and fill the tanks properly with no damage to pumps or motors when power is restored after failures. We also still have surge protection. They also found the meter at the well-house was not accurate and error codes were confusing.

All of these diagnostics were meticulous and time consuming, and there were delays in receiving ordered parts. The system was restored to working order by January 7, although more repairs are still needed for long-term repair. Some components are no longer stocked by local suppliers so need to be sourced more widely.

In addition to working to finalize those repairs, the CMCC board is working on planning for future water emergencies, stocking some back-up parts when possible, and we have a spare pump on hand now. More information will be available at our Annual Shareholder Meeting. We hope you will join us then.

Overall, we are grateful for the high level of expertise and quick response time by all technicians that were called in, and for the CMCC volunteers who are skilled and experienced in operating our water system, and who worked tirelessly to rectify a very complicated situation. And we are grateful to you for contributing to the community’s water conservation efforts during a challenging time.

Thank you.

We’ve heard from a few community members that were experiencing cloudy/discolored water. There was a small issue (which is now resolved) with a valve at Toad Lane that may have caused high water flows through the piping.

When the water flows through the lines at high volumes, Ferric Iron (res water iron) that is loosely adhered to the inside of the pipes can be scrubbed loose and flow downstream. Most of the loose Ferric Iron should be flushed out now, but if you are downstream from Toad Lane, you may find your water is cloudy and has reddish brown particles in it for a few days. This has no effect on the water quality (other than visually).

If you are experiencing this condition you may run water through all of your taps (inside and out of the dwelling) for 5 to 10 minutes. This should remedy the condition. If the condition persists please contact the CMCC water system Manger for further guidance.

Additional Notes:

• To avoid cloudy water within your house plumbing, you could opt to consider installing a whole house filter. An example of a water filter installation can be found on this site under the Water System section.
• Learn more about your water quality in the latest Consumer Confidence Report which is sent to you annually, and filed under the Water System section on this site.

Thanks to the hard work of many, the water system is working for now and our tanks are half full. So the conserve water request has been lifted, and there is no boil water notice in effect.

The system is not entirely fixed, but a control system company technician will be working to figure out why the control panels failed and repair them as soon as possible.

Thank you for your efforts to conserve water during this time. You may return to normal water use now.

Thank you for your patience and for continuing to conserve water.

Unfortunately the pump delivery hit further delays.

In the meantime community volunteers have been working long hours to try to resolve this issue.

We were able to get our pump working for a few hours and then it failed again.

It was concerning to our well technician that the well pump was pumping at all if it had failed, so we looked into other issues and found that the well meter and one pump station vfd was only working intermittently. We were able to get some water in one tank before everything failed.

We have a team continuing to work on it this morning but don’t want to raise anyone’s hopes until we are able fill one tank.

We will continue to post updates here as we have more information.

Thank you for continuing to conserve water. Our water usage has come down since our last notification.

Unfortunately there has been a delay in the delivery of the new water pump. It’s now scheduled to be delivered and installed on Friday (tomorrow).

We have water deliveries coming which should now accommodate our current water usage.

After the new pump is installed the conserve water request will be lifted, but there will be a boil water notice in effect until water samples can be tested and deemed safe for drinking. With the lab’s schedule that could be around middle of next week.

Updates and more information will continue to be posted to the website here. You can sign up for notifications by using the “Follow” button on the bottom right of this page, and entering your email address.

We also send emails and text messages re: urgent water notices like this. If you or someone you know is not receiving the messages, please contact us to ensure we have the correct contact information on file. Thank you.

Please USE AS LITTLE WATER AS NECESSARY until further notice.

We have nearly used up all our water even with the recent deliveries (18K gallons delivered on 12/30, and another 18K yesterday). We are trying to get more water delivered today, but it may not be possible. We have approximately 12 thousand gallons in the tanks to get us through tomorrow evening when we hope to have the new pump up and running. At our current usage level, that will not be enough.

We are looking for water leaks. Let us know if you see out of the ordinary water by the side roads and please USE AS LITTLE WATER AS NECESSARY until further notice.

Thank you.

Thank you for continuing to conserve water.

We believe that the well pump failed, but will not know for certain until the old pump and motor have been removed. Last January’s issue was a result of the well pump motor failing. This time, an entire new pump and motor combination will be installed. This is not an off-the-shelf part, but is made to order using off-the-shelf parts. Everything is in stock and is scheduled to arrive and be installed on Thursday.

For now, we have had 18 thousand gallons of water delivered. At our current usage, this should last us until the middle of next week.

Thank you for your help continuing to conserve water as best you can.