Town officials say a chemical used during routine maintenance caused turned the community’s water pink. (Facebook)
The Town of Onoway is apologizing to its 1,000 residents after drinking water from taps started running bright pink.
Complaints about strange fuchsia hues started pouring into the town office Monday night.
Residents of the town, 60 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, were puzzled and perturbed by the bright pink water, and took to social media to share their concerns.
In a statement posted to its Facebook page at 10 a.m. Tuesday, the town said the strange colour was caused by a chemical used during routine flushing of the lines and was not a cause for concern.
“Yesterday, during normal line flushing and filter backwashing, a valve seems to have stuck open allowing potassium permanganate to get into the sump reservoir,” reads the statement. “The reservoir was drained, however some of the chemical still made it into the distribution system.
“While it is alarming to see pink water coming from your taps, potassium permanganate is used in normal treatment processes to help remove iron and manganese and residents were never at risk.”
Alberta Environment will be inspecting the water lines Tuesday afternoon and the town is hoping to complete all necessary repairs and maintenance by end of day Tuesday.
The town did not comment publicly on the incident until hours after the first complaints were made.
Mayor Dale Krasnow apologized for that on the town’s website.
“We were never advised by Alberta Environment to issue a public advisory and all indications are that there was never a public health risk,” said Krasnow.
“Could the town have done a better job of communicating what was going on yesterday to our community — absolutely, without a doubt. And we do apologize for that.”
Potassium permanganate, also known as potassium salt, is a chemical disinfectant commonly used to remove iron and hydrogen sulphide (rotten egg smell) from well water and waste water.
Although not highly toxic, concentrated solutions of potassium permanganate can be harmful to the skin.
Permanganate is a strong oxidizer similar to chlorine. It can cause irritation or burns when the undiluted salt makes direct contact with skin.