Water tower level may hurt fire fights

BARGERSVILLE, Ind. (WISH) - Extreme conditions are wreaking havoc on water usage, and for many communities, water levels.

In Bargersville, water officials said the levels in one water tower near the Center Grove area have reached critical levels.

“There's been an excessive demand on our system, mainly for irrigation … . For the last two weeks, we've been exceeding our rate of capacity in supplying the demand on our system. Because of that, it slowly has been deteriorating our reserves, to be able to supply that added water,” explained Mike Davis, Bargersville Utilities superintendent. “We've hit a critical point on one of our reserve elevated storage tanks, which puts public safety at risk.”

He’s talking about the tower near Johnson County Road 135 South and Stones Crossing Road.

Davis said for the last two weeks, Bargersville’s systems have been running non-stop. This morning, the tower near Stones Crossing Road was holding only four feet of water. Typically, that tower holds 30 feet of water, or 500,000 gallons.

It supplies water mainly to the area between Stones Crossing Road and Whiteland Road. Davis said some of those residents have now experienced lower water pressure because of the low levels in the tower, but he’s mainly concerned about public safety.

“In case of a fire, four foot of water would only last minutes,” Davis said. “If fires would occur in this dry weather, in areas that tank supplies reservoir water, we would not be able to supply that water to the fire departments. They will have to go to other areas and truck that water in.”

Davis is hoping residents will voluntarily conserve, so they won't have to issue water restrictions.

Ron Bacon lives near that water tower, and said he’ll now think twice when he turns on the faucet.

“If me cutting back would bring water back up, I'd be willing to do that,” Bacon said. “Gotta make sure the fire department can fight fires.”

It's not only the Bargersville area experiencing extreme water usage.

Wednesday, customers of Citizens Water in central Indiana used 231 million gallons of water. That sets a new record for water usage. The previous was 228 million gallons of water in a day.

A spokesperson said if usage continues like this for two more weeks, they may be forced to issue mandatory water restrictions.

24-Hour News 8 also called a number of other communities to see how their water usage is.

Carmel, Westfield and anyone using Indiana American Water are seeing high usage, but all said they are able to supply demand, as of now.

But all utilities are asking people to conserve so levels don’t get dangerously low.

Westfield, among others, released a list of ways residents can conserve water:

• Reduce irrigation: 40 percent of water usage is a direct result of irrigation. Only water lawn once a week. Experts say lawns only need one inch of water per week to remain healthy. Note: New lawns, flowers and other plants often require more frequent watering. Trees less than three years old require 15 gallons of water per week.
• Irrigate early: Irrigating lawns and plants from 4 a.m. to 7 a.m. will reduce evaporation. Watering at midday results in as much as 30 percent water loss due to evaporation.
• Proper use of garden hose: Check for spigot leaks, and always use a nylon or rubber hose washer to tighten hose connections to prevent leaks. Sweep sidewalks and driveways, do not use hose.