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The city of Toledo released an urgent notice to all Toledo water users overnight. The city is asking anyone who receives water from Toledo to avoid drinking or boiling the water. This warning also affects people in Lucas County and parts of Michigan.
Chemists testing water at Toledo's Collins Park Water Treatment Plant tested for microcystin in excess of the recommended amount. Health officials are advising businesses who use water to treat this like a level 3 snow emergency and remain closed.
What happened? What is being done?
Lake Erie, which is a source of drinking water for the Toledo water system may have been impacted by a harmful algal bloom (HAB). These organisms are capable of producing a number of toxins that may pose a risk to human and animal health. HABs occur when excess nitrogen and phosphorus are present in lakes and streams. Such nutrients can come from runoff of over-fertilized fields and lawns, from malfunctioning septic systems and from livestock pens.
originally posted by: elevatedone
I was just telling the wife, we'll wait this out a couple of hour and hope for an update on how long this is going to last.
If we need to, then yeah, travel a little ways and pick up some water somewhere.
(source)
They say heavy April showers are washing fertilizer off farm fields into the water in larger amounts, and those chemicals feed algae blooms that starve the lake of oxygen. Feeding on phosphorus, algae produces bad smells and toxins that are absorbed by underwater life, choking it off.
originally posted by: elevatedone
I was just telling the wife, we'll wait this out a couple of hour and hope for an update on how long this is going to last.
If we need to, then yeah, travel a little ways and pick up some water somewhere.
originally posted by: Blackmarketeer
You do NOT want to know what that was like.
Canadian geese are everywhere. Studies have shown that one adult goose will excrete 0.86 pounds of phosphorus a year, over twice the amount of organic phosphorus (0.42 pounds) in runoff from an acre of unfertilized turf, and almost three times the amount of organic phosphorus (0.3 pounds) in runoff from an acre of fertilized turf.
originally posted by: elevatedone