A boil order was lifted Friday morning in the Morgan Park and Beverly neighborhoods, a day after a century-old Far South Side pumping station lost power, but residents were advised to run their faucets for five minutes before drinking the water.
Water samples tested by the Department of Water Management showed the water is safe to drink, department spokeswoman Megan Vidis said in a statement.
The boil order was issued Thursday as a precautionary measure after the Roseland pumping station lost power for an hour following ComEd maintenance, causing water pressure loss for thousands of people, Vidis said.
The exact cause of the outage remains under investigation, she said.
The outage affected buildings as far west as Albany Avenue, north of 119th Street, and west of I-57 to southwest of Beverly Avenue.
The Department of Water Management advised people affected by the order to do the following now that the boil order was lifted:
- Flush all faucets. Run all cold-water faucets for 5 minutes. Instructions for intensive flushing can be found here.
- Flush drinking fountains by continuously running for 5 minutes.
- Flush automatic icemakers. Make 3 batches of ice and discard all 3 batches.
- Drain and refill hot water tanks.
- If you have a water softener, run water through a regeneration cycle.
- If you have a point of use or inline water filters, sediment and/or Reverse Osmosis systems perform the recommended filter change or back-wash in accordance with the manufacturer’s specifications.
- Drain reservoirs in large buildings that have water-holding reservoirs.
- Flush water coolers: run coolers with direct water connections for 5 minutes.
- Re-start and flush any water-using fixture in accordance with the manufacturer’s specifications.
For questions, residents can contact the Water Quality Surveillance Section at (312) 744-8190 or call 311.
