The Ozark Mountain Regional Public Water Authority’s (OMRPWA) water treatment plant is slowly recovering from a lightning strike that happened around noon Wednesday. According to the Harrison Daily Times, the strike damaged the equipment and software program that control the pumps and valves, in addition to the treatment equipment at the facility on Bull Shoals Lake near Tucker Hollow.
The shutdown had the potential to disrupt service to 20,000 homes and businesses and four North Arkansas counties, including Marion, Boone, Searcy and Newton. The water authority provides water to 18 water systems stretching from Diamond City to Deer.
According to OMRPWA board chairman Andy Anderson, two of the three filters are now working and pumping water, but all of the finer details must be done manually, including adjusting the flow into and out of the filters, adjusting the chemical fee rates and controlling the pumps to move the finished water to the storage tanks and out into the authority’s 18 systems. Normally all of the details are automatically handled by the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, but the system is still not fully functional due to the damage it took following the lightning strike.
As of Saturday morning, Anderson reported the authority has plenty of water, but some customers’ tank levels may not be as high as normal. He says it will take a while to get repairs finished and customers need to conserve water until repairs are done.
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