|
The 1980 Amherst, Massachusetts water shortage was a water crisis in Amherst, Massachusetts that amongst other things, closed the University of Massachusetts Amherst for three days. It came at a time when communities across the state were experiencing water crises of their own in the region's worst drought since 1965. ==Background== The summer of 1980 was a dry summer for much of the state of Massachusetts. After weeks of drought, the town's reservoirs started to fall below their normal levels. Precipitation totals since the beginning of July had been half of what they usually were and temperatures were higher than normal. The Atkins Reservoir in nearby Shutesbury was six feet below normal while the Hills Reservoir in nearby Pelham was thirteen feet below normal with its output reduced by half. A third reservoir in the same town was two and a half feet under normal levels. On August 31, the campus reopened and students from all over began returning to school. Labor Day weekend brought more challenges to the system as temperatures climbed into the 80s and demand for water by Labor Day soared to , more than the previous record.〔 Normally, the school uses half of the that the town produces in an average day. By Tuesday, Amherst Town Manager Louis Hayward had a dilemma. Compounding the problem was the fact that in South Amherst, construction of a new well in Lawrence Swamp was still at least a month from completion. This issue then caused the Amherst Board of Selectman on the following Monday to declare a water emergency, with the aim of cutting water usage by one quarter by banning all outside use of water. Additionally, authorization was given to selectman to approach the neighboring town of Hadley and purchase water from them. University officials were also placed on a state of alert and asked to cut back water use, something that was asked for two years earlier by the school when they put up signs asking students to help with water conservation. During the morning, the fire department was also notified by the town's department of public works to the fact that alarms on the town's four storage tanks were showing signs that levels had dropped to forty feet, well below the normal level of sixty-two feet. This caused an increase in pumping of water into the tanks.〔 The first signs of trouble came the next morning when a resident of William M. Cashin House on the northern end of campus called the school's maintenance to report low water levels. A plumber was dispatched and after checking that the filters weren't clogged, determined it was a supply problem. A call was placed into the local water department. By early afternoon, notices were posted in the dorm advising students on the fifth through eighth floors that there was no water available. Complaints began to trickle in from the Sylvan, Orchard Hill, and Central Residential Areas. All these dorms were on a hill relative to the rest of campus. Health services then went out to local markets and purchased distilled water and secured two fifty-five gallon drums from a Holyoke company.〔 Eventually, plumbers were dispatched to shut off water to first the individual floors, then entire buildings. By six that night, the Physical Plant director alerted Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance George Beatty about the impending crisis. Around forty five minutes later, the town manager was notified of the problem. Around this time, water shortages were beginning to be noticed in the Southwest Residential Area. In the Mildred Pierpont House, toilets wouldn’t stop flushing, a consequence of low water pressure. By 9:30 that night, about 3,000 students were without water. Chancellor Henry Koffler returned from meetings in Boston and was subsequently warned by Beatty that if the pressure continued to drop, the steam plant would have to be shut down, and research projects, air conditioning, and electrical systems would also have to be turned off. All of this would prove costly. By this time, students were travelling to Puffers Pond in North Amherst to clean up. The chancellor was also urged by Hayward to close the campus.〔 In a last-ditch effort an hour and a half later, water was ordered shut off to the Southwest Residential Area, which contained 5,600 residents at the time. Water service to the John W. Lederle Graduate Research Center, Herter, and Tobin Halls as well as the showers at the Boyden Gym were also shut off. Reports from the night state that some students began to hoard water in pails before the taps were shut off. By four the next morning, it was determined that the shutdown of water to the area had no effect and so service was restored. As a result of people leaving the faucets on, the bathrooms flooded when service was restored.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「1980 Amherst, Massachusetts water shortage」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|