Mississippi declares water emergency for Jackson

WASHINGTON: Mississippi officials declared a health emergency on Tuesday after historic flooding damaged treatment systems and left 180,000 people in the state capital Jackson without safe drinking water.

Governor Tate Reeves warned residents about the crisis and on Tuesday deployed the National Guard to assist in water distribution throughout the city. The Mississippi State Department of Health (MSDH) said water treatment pumps had failed and there were low levels of water in storage tanks serving Jackson.

Many city taps were dry, and water that was flowing was contaminated or untreated, officials cautioned. "We do not have reliable running water at scale," Reeves told a press conference late on Monday.

"The city cannot produce enough water to fight fires, to reliably flush toilets and to meet other critical needs," he said, adding emergency services would distribute drinking water to residents in a "massively complicated logistical task." Facing aging infrastructure, Jackson has been under a boil water order since late July.

Recent torrential rains intensified the crisis as the city’s Pearl River has faced historic flooding, which finally started to ease on Monday, Jackson City Hall said in a statement. "It is no surprise that we have a very fragile water-treatment facility, and (the city’s treatment plant) OB Curtis receives its water from the reservoir, and because of the river water coming into the plant, we have to change how we treat the water," Jackson Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba said at a press conference, according to the Mississippi Clarion Ledger newspaper.