City of Louisville learned a few things after losing water

LOUISVILLE, Miss. (WCBI) – In an update to a story we’ve been following since December, people who live in Louisville are back under full pressure.

The temperature dropped. Pipes froze. And the city of Louisville went without water. It didn’t happen all at once. So, it wasn’t repaired all at once. When we went to Louisville just before New Year’s, there was very little water.

And when the water finally returns, everyone was required to boil it for safety.

The taps are running freely now. And, the mayor said that’s due to hard work and a can-do attitude.

Just a couple of days after Christmas The City of Louisville lost access to all water in the area because of the hard freeze. There were leaks all around town. And, little to no water pressure.

Louisville Mayor Will Hill said a crisis like that made him realize a few things.

“You don’t know what you got until it’s gone and we just as a society take so much for granted and with that weather event that happened right at Christmas there was so much focus on electric and electric usage and next thing you know it got so cold so fast and we were dealing with the consequences of a hard freeze in short order and unexpectedly a water crisis but thankful we were able to respond and react in short order,” said Hill.

City workers reacted quickly and worked long hours.

Hill said it was about 25 hours. That’s when most residents began to see the water started flowing again. Hill said he saw this crisis bring the community together.

“You can tell with testimony that this is a resilient community as is probably every community but it shows what a community is about and obviously we have to ask for patience in any circumstance or situation that’s not planned you react and respond to a crisis and this was a crisis,” said Mayor Hill.

Now, weeks later Hill said the pipes are working better than before.

“The system is as strong as it’s ever been. The pumps to refill the wells. It was a variety of issues that all happened at once with breaks on city systems and also on private property or industrial property and things of that sort so it was a domino effect you couldn’t put your finger on one isolated event that caused the issue but quick response but we were back up and going, ” said Hill.

Around 3,500 customers were affected by the original outage.

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