Dear Editor,
I write this letter to you on behalf of my friends living in the Covent Garden, Prospect and Little Diamond areas.
The well which is located in the Covent Garden area has been down since Saturday, June 27. Serious attempts have been made to find out what the problem is, as well as when the water would be up and running, but to no avail.
The well at Covent Garden seems to be problematic. If my memory serves me correctly, for this year there have been about 4 or 5 such outages. These frequent water outages are having an adverse effect on the communities that depend upon this source of life.
People are at their wits end and some are praying for rain, as that seems to be the only source that will provide some relief.
This situation creates an unhealthy environment for the children who go to school in the area.
I guess there is nothing more I can do for them other than write this letter. There really is no one to complain to.
Yours faithfully,
K. Persaud
Editor’s note
We are sending a copy of this letter to Mr Rawle Aaron, the PRO of Guyana Water Inc for any comments he might wish to make.
According to a Chronicle newspapers article dating back to June of 2003, GWI spent $562 million on a water project which was supposed to benefit 65,000 persons living between Eccles and Friendship (including Covent Garden, Diamond Grove,and Mocha/Arcadia) . Toolsie Persaud laid the pipelines and Atkins international supervised the entire project.
Just in the past few weeks the government signed a multimillion-dollar contract for the drilling of a well to serve the Grove/Diamond and Belle Vue areas. I made some technical comments in this newspapers on this contract at that time.
If the government continues not to demand that water well contractors perform their obligations in accordance with the basic minimum well drilling design standards, then they are going to have more frequent occurrences like the critical situation with the Covent Garden well.
As I pointed out before in this newspapers, oil well drillers are not trained to drill water wells. And this is the kind of people who were contracted by your government to drill your water wells (Well & Oil Service of Trinidad&Tobago).
A properly tested, designed and maintained water well should have a life span of at least 50 years. I can guarantee that those expensive wells being currently drilled will not last 5 years, if that long, without major problems.
As I look around the country, I see quite frequent reports of major water well problems. These problems are not going to “go away”. In fact, be prepared to expect a vast increase in these complaints due mainly to the absence of critical well data, which the government is not collecting, and a non-existent maintainence water well program.
Then the GWI is going to want to raise water rates to “fix” the problem. The Barbados Water Authority (BWA) and the Trinidad&Tobago Water And Sewerage Authority (WASA) are facing the exact same dilemma as GWI. BWA and WASA have announced intentions to raise water rates but these are being greeted by very strong public opposition. The Thompson and Manning Admindtrations are under fire for this.
This is just the tip of the iceburg. Expect much more water well failures to surface in the not too distant future. And the government continues to issue multimillion-dollar contracts to “oil well drillers” to drill water wells (eg Grove/Diamond well). As I said before in this newspapers, oil well drillers are not trained to drill water wells.
There is a very simple soultion to the Covent Garden well problem. I can outline this solution. But if the government has the professional expertise to address the problem, then they should step up to the plate. The GWI PRO is only talk. The situation is critical. No more time for talk. Either Put UP or Shut Up.
I’ve heard an engineer voice similar concerns recently. But looking around, there are some wells, hand dug over 100 years ago that are still functioning
You are correct. Some hand dug wells have been running for centuries. It all depends on the geology at that well site location.
If you are referring to hand dug wells in Barbados then my guess is that those wells either tap or is recharged by the prolific limestone formations.
Are you referring to hand dug wells in Barbados? Then Thompson, and his crew at the BWA, ought to make a field trip to those well locations and study the Hydrogeology there. Then they would learn something about drilling dependable and affordable water wells for their people. And, consequently, they wouldn’t have to keep raising the water rates. Please refer to the link on water rates increase in Barbados.
http://www.stabroeknews.com/2009/news/regional/07/01/water-rates-in-barbados-to-go-up-60/comment-page-2/#comments
you know why this well is not working? 28 years of PHENC rule ow laudo how we survive the 28 years ah doan know….