Water Service to Bedford, Colleyville, Euless, Grapevine and North Richland Hills

Interrupted by Power Failure

            Arlington- Trinity River Authority’s raw water intake pump station located on Lake Arlington Dam lost power during last night’s storm event, resulting in a seriously diminished ability to provide drinking water to Bedford, Colleyville, Euless, Grapevine and North Richland Hills. Residents of these cities are requested to severely restrict all non-essential water use until further notice.

Oncor is in the process of trying to restore power to the TRA pump station, but the exact timing of a resumption of normal service is unknown. Complying will require elimination of all outside water usage, including landscape irrigation and watering, non-commercial car washing, swimming pool draining and refilling and any inside water usage which could practically be delayed until a later time when treatment and distribution operations have returned to normal. 

The quality of water delivered to the residents and businesses in these five cities will be normal and there should be no concern about its quality or any health concerns.  Some of the five cities may utilize wells which they have in service for standby to supplement the treated water normally delivered to their citizens, so there could be some differences detected in taste, or an odor detected during the interim time period, but all water supplied should meet state and federal health and quality standards.

            Emergency connections between the water distribution systems owned by Arlington and Fort Worth have been activated. It is doubtful that use of these connections will be adequate to meet the average daily use of TRA’s five customer cities.  The Trinity River Authority’s regional water system can normally treat and distribute over 75 million gallons of water per day for the five cities, but until electrical power is restored, will be limited to about 25 million gallons per day, using water obtained from Arlington and Fort Worth on a temporary basis.

            Warren Brewer, TRA’s Northern Region Manager said, “It is essential that all homeowners, businesses and governmental entities in our service area in northeast Tarrant County respond to this emergency by curtailing unnecessary water use immediately and until further notice.”

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT JOHN JADROSICH, TRA PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICER AT (817) 467-4343.