Prudence Island Ends 8-Year Boil-Water Advisory After System Upgrades
PRUDENCE ISLAND, R.I. — For the first time in eight years, residents of the Prudence Island Water District have been told they no longer need to boil their tap water, closing a chapter that defined daily life on the Narragansett Bay island since 2018, the Providence Journal reported.
On Oct. 6, the Rhode Island Department of Health told the water district it could lift the long-standing boil-water advisory affecting most of the 5.5-square-mile island's roughly 250 year-round residents and about 1,500 people during peak summer season. The advisory dated to Oct. 5, 2018, when a water sample from the island's main storage tank tested positive for total coliform and E. coli bacteria; the district had reissued boil-water advisories every 90 days since, a bureaucratic drumbeat that became part of island life.
Getting to this point required years of work and investment. In addition to requiring chlorination for the whole system, the health department mandated iron and manganese treatment at the district's Indian Spring wells, one of its two drinking water sources, which had traditionally high iron concentrations — the likely source of the muddy-brown water residents on the island's north end had long experienced.
"Our tubs and toilets would be ringed with this yellow tinge," said year-round resident Jodi Lamagna. "Sometimes you could see the water coming out of the faucet with a rusty red discoloration. Now, that is not happening, and the water seems clean. I'm hoping that I can reclaim some of my white laundry."
Prudence Island is technically a village belonging to Portsmouth, accessible by ferry, and its small year-round community has long prided itself on self-reliance. Residents said the end of the advisory felt like a long-delayed return to normal — and a reminder of how much work goes into something as basic as turning on the tap.
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：普鲁登斯岛一带纳拉甘西特湾航拍。公有领域，来源：Wikimedia Commons
