‘Today’s the day’ for water restoration in Henrico

Water service is being restored gradually Thursday to the 23,000 Eastern and Northern Henrico customers who were still without it Wednesday.

“If you’re in Eastern Henrico, today is the day as it relates to the water,” Varina District Supervisor Tyrone Nelson said in a video posted to social media Thursday morning. “You’re going to get water back today unless something crazy happens.”

Water began reaching a number of affected communities in Eastern and Northern Henrico last night, Nelson said. Many other affected county residents who have been without water for two days are seeing it return gradually this morning. They may be experiencing a trickle of water flow, gurgling or air pressure.

“What our people are telling us is when you hear that, that lets you know that the water is coming,” Nelson said. “We have verified that there are several places in Eastern Henrico where people do have water now, just low pressure. The pressure’s going to increase throughout the day. If you have a trickle now, then you’re going to have some low pressure water probably in a couple hours.”

“Twelve hours from now, we’ll be in a way better place than we are right now.”

Water flow increases from city

Henrico is receiving water from the city at the rate of about 6 million gallons per day, Henrico Public Relations Director Ben Sheppard told the Citizen Thursday morning. That's more than the 4 million to 5 million gallons per day the county typically receives from the city, Sheppard said, though the county's 2023 Water Quality Report indicated that during Fiscal Year 2023 (which ended June 30 that year), the county received about 11 million gallons daily from the city.

All of Henrico County remains under a boil water advisory Thursday, which means that residents should boil water vigorously for at least one minute before cooling it to use for drinking or cooking purposes. Showering or bathing in the water without boiling it, however, is safe, though residents should avoid getting water in their mouths or swallowing it, and those with open wounds should take additional precautions.

The restoration of service is primarily the result of the city of Richmond’s water treatment facility – which typically serves Eastern Henrico and part of Northern Henrico – gradually regaining functionality after losing power Monday.

On Wednesday afternoon, the city’s plant began filling its Church Hill water tank, which serves the Elko region of Eastern Henrico. Simultaneously, water was beginning to fill Henrico’s Laburnum/Azalea pressure zone and then the Greater Eubank zone, which feeds most of the Varina District.

Residents will notice fire hydrants open, releasing water to help rid water lines of trapped air, Sheppard said.

Timeline of water issues

After Monday’s initial outage in Richmond, Henrico officials worked to pump water from the county’s water treatment facility at Three Chopt and Gaskins roads in the West End to Eastern Henrico. That worked briefly, until a water main break in Sandston Monday night disrupted the flow, essentially causes “leaks” in the system as water returned toward Richmond through open valves, cutting off water service to much of Eastern and Northern Henrico.

Henrico officials spent Tuesday and part of Wednesday closing several dozen of those valves to force the water back to the affected areas, but the process was tedious and water was slow to refill the necessary zones.

“We’d get one thing fixed, another thing didn’t work, and so yesterday we went back to what we originally [did], which is get water from the city of Richmond,” Nelson said.

The Virginia Department of Health implemented a boil water advisory for Eastern Henrico Wednesday afternoon, recognizing that some water in the area was not flowing through the system adequately, but Henrico officials extended that advisory to the entire county, saying that it would be impossible to guarantee that potentially contaminated water remained only in Eastern Henrico once it entered the county’s system.

Just before 9 a.m. Thursday, city officials reported that their reservoir was almost full and that eight of their targeted nine water zones were back online. Once the ninth zone reaches the desired threshold, city officials will begin testing water to ensure its cleanliness.

Reports on social media Thursday morning from Henrico residents seemed to indicate that much of Highland Springs and Sandston near Richmond International Airport remained without any water, as did some areas along Route 5 corridor close to the city line. But a few Highland Springs residents did report having a slow trickle of water.

The airport itself still does not have water pressure, according to a social media post officials there made just before 10:30 a.m. Thursday.

Farther east along Route 5, near I-295, residents reported having at least low water pressure. Residents in the Hechler Village community along South Laburnum Avenue near Nine Mile Road and the Central Gardens community near Mechanicsville Turnpike and the city line also reported having low or full water pressure, as did several people in the Glen Lea area near Richmond Raceway.

Resources for Henrico residents

Henrico officials are operating several locations at which residents can pick up bottled water, fill containers with potable water or shower. But just before 11 a.m. Thursday, officials wrote that they were experiencing "temporary gaps" in their supply of bottled water because of high demand.

As a result, officials encouraged resident to conserve water to whatever extent possible. Bottled water will continue to be delivered throughout the day to six locations but may not be available on a continuous basis as a result:

• Eastern Henrico Government Center, 3820 Nine Mile Road;
• Eastern Henrico Recreation Center, 1440 North Laburnum Avenue;
• Henrico Sports and Events Center, 1 All Star Boulevard, Glen Allen;
• Brookland Middle School, 9200 Lydell Drive;
• Tucker High School, 2910 North Parham Road;
• Wilder Middle School, 6900 Wilkinson Road.

Officials are asking residents who need water – for drinking or other purposes – to use the tanker trucks that are stationed at the Eastern Henrico Government Center, Eastern Henrico Recreation Center and Henrico Sports and Events Center 24 hours a day; those who do so must bring their own containers, however.

Shower facilities are available 24 hours a day at the Henrico Sports and Events Center and between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. daily at Brookland Middle, Wilder Middle and Tucker High until further notice, officials said.

In addition, the Tuckahoe (9211 Patterson Avenue), John Rolfe (2244 John Rolfe Parkway) and Shady Grove (11255 Nuckols Road) Family YMCAs in Henrico are open during normal hours for any residents who need to shower, as is the Weinstein JCC (5403 Monument Avenue). Residents should bring photo IDs to those sites.

The county also has established a dedicated web page for all water-related updates; it is available here.

Additional water delivered by Hopewell company

Virginia American Water is delivering 19 pallets of one-liter bottles of water to the Henrico Sports and Events Center this afternoon as part of a larger donation to several localities in Central Virginia affected by water outages.

In total, the company is donating more than 20,000 gallons of drinking water to distribution sites in Henrico, Richmond and Hanover.

It sent a 6,000-gallon tanker truck of water to Southside Plaza in Richmond (507 East Southside Plaza) for distribution (residents must bring their own containers to fill) and also sent 19 pallets of one-liter bottles of water to the Greater Richmond Convention Center (403 North 3rd Street in Richmond) and 19 pallets of half-liter water bottles to Atlee High School in Hanover.

The company also is facilitating the free filling of six 2,000-gallon tanker trucks for the Virginia National Guard at the company’s Hopewell facility. Company officials said they planned to bring in tanker trucks as needed until boil advisories are lifted and that they also are providing volunteers for distribution sites around the region.