Focus

Living without running water

(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-08-09 11:27

Residents line up at the Tonghua People's Hospital to get drinking water. The hospital is one of 22 water supply centers across the city shipping 1,700 tons of drinking water every day.  Zhang Tao / China Daily

Resilient residents resort to water-saving measures as floods cut supply lines. Cui Jia reports from Tonghua.

Just like most of his neighbors, Bai Qilun spent the most part of Sunday, Aug 1, in a long line waiting to buy bottled water. He had been rudely awakened from his sleep at 6:30 am when his wife discovered the taps in their home had run dry.

"As soon as I opened my eyes, I was dragged from my bed and told to buy as much bottled water as I could," said the 30-year-old Bai, whose native city of Tonghua in Jilin province has in recent weeks been battered by heavy storms.

"It was unusual as we rarely have a water shortage," said Wang Jingjing, Bai's wife and mother to his son.

Residents in Tonghua, Jilin province, receive water from a supply center last week. Sun Liguo / for China Daily

She barely had time to worry about how her family would cook and clean without running water before the phone began to ring off the hook, with friends and relatives across the city rushing to confirm that the water supply had been cut off late on July 31.

According to the authorities, four pipes linking the city's only water source with its water-filtering factory were severely damaged by floodwaters caused by torrential rainfall. About 330,000 people were affected.

"Bottled water is like gold on the first day without running water," said Bai, who waited 30 minutes to buy 20 liters of bottled mineral water at his local community store at 7 am. Just minutes later, the shop sold out.

"People were panicked," he said.

Widespread panic can mean big profits for storeowners and some businesses even hiked prices to take advantage.

Liu Xin, who is in his 40s and runs Xinxin convenient store, admitted he rose prices of bottle water in his shop by one-third shortly after hearing about the severed supply.

"People were buying like crazy because they feared the water would sell out," he said.

The city authority quickly curbed such profiteering ways with a notice threatening businesses that inflate prices during shortages with fines for "illegal competition".

"They told me that raising the price of water would cause people to worry more about the crisis," said Liu, who agreed put a sign on his door stating that prices were the same as usual after being visited by officials.

To further crack down on price gouging, the city government also pledged to ensure adequate supplies of bottled water by importing 150,000 crates of water from neighboring counties every day.

Engineers are now drafting plans to fully restore supplies across the city as soon as possible.

"We held a meeting to discuss the possible options and decided to construct a 350-meter-long temporary pipeline on a bridge over the Hani River," said Wang Runmin, director of the Tonghua public utility bureau.

More than 300 workers were sent to the site on Aug 1 to start the repair work and the temporary link was completed last Tuesday.

However, as the link can supply a maximum of just 7 tons of tap water a day, compared to the city's need for 10 tons, the water supply was only partially resumed the next day.

To cover the shortage, the government has built another temporary pipe, which was scheduled to be in use on Monday.

The four pipelines that burst were all built 25 years ago beneath the bridge. Officials said that construction of permanent water lines would start as soon as the flood season finishes and will take three months to complete.

Meanwhile, lines of people waiting to collect water being pumped from underground sources by the fire service have become a common sight. The water has been available at 25 locations across 22 communities from 5 am until 9 pm since Aug 2.

"I tell every resident who comes to collect water that it is not drinkable," said firefighter Xiao Yang as he filled kettles and buckets. "The underground water has not been disinfected."

Harsh lessons

Small businesses and hospitals were the worst affected by the shortage. Car washes and bathhouses were told to close down by the authorities to save on water, while small restaurants were also shut because they could not afford to cook and wash up with expensive bottled water.

"We have to rely solely on bottled water to perform all disinfections," said Wang Li, a nurse at Tonghua People's Hospital, as she poured water onto a doctor's hands before surgery.

However, although living without running water may be difficult, it has failed to defeat the resilient residents of Tonghua, many of whom reverted to water-saving techniques to cope with the shortage.

"It is a serious reminder of all we take for granted," said Bai thoughtfully, whose family took to using paper plates and plastic cutlery to save on washing up.

"We had to manually fill the toilet whenever it needs flushing," he said, recalling how he had to carry heavy buckets of water up to his home on the fifth floor. "It really wasn't fun."

The situation has also raised residents' awareness of water conservation. Many said they have started to keep water-filled plastic bottles in their toilet cisterns to limit the amount of water they use every time they flush.

For most people, the restored supply means life has already returned to normal. Yet, some see the inconvenience they experienced during the four-day drought as a precious lesson.

"The point is that we can survive without running water," said Zhang Hua, a retired teacher in his 60s. "But it is time like this when you realize how precious water is.

"Maybe some people will think twice before they let the water run as they brush your teeth, listening to the drain gurgle as all that clean water washes away," he said.

The mayor of Tonghua presses the button to restart the city's water supply at a treatment plant in the suburbs on Aug 4. Zhang Tao / China Daily

People shop for bottled water at a supermarket in Tonghua after the city's water supply was damaged by heavy floods. Zhang Tao / China Daily