Pink-colored water on the Health Science Campus was not safe for drinking last week, warned UT Health and Safety officials.
There was a ban on drinking water on the parts of the HSC until Saturday.
Water in the Block Health Science Building was reported to be pink by an employee, which led to an immediate sampling of the water, according to Gary Jankowski, associate vice president for health and safety.
"Once we found out, we took all the necessary steps needed to be taken and jumped on the problem and took many samples," he said.
Health and Safety officials issued an alert regarding the water in three Health Science Campus buildings, including Mulford Library and the Health Education Building, as a precaution.
"A device called the backflow preventer for some reason did not work. That allowed a very small concentration [of chemicals] to enter the supply of the drinking fountain," Jankowski said.
"Wherever there's a possibility where dirty and clean water meet, the backflow preventer device is used to prevent clean and contaminated water from mixing," said Matt Lockwood, UT director of public relations.
According to Lockwood, there was a report of leaking water in one of the mechanical rooms in the Block Health Science Building. Maintenance staff had to shut down the backflow preventer to repair it.
"They opened a bypass valve in the meantime, and everything would have been fine. But a plumber shut down a domestic water pump [in the building] at the same time," he said.
The pressure difference caused by those two acts allowed some of the contaminated water, which contained a small amount of ethylene glycol, a coolant used in the building, to mix with the clean water.
Jankowski added, however, the contaminant was so diluted by the regular water supply that the most danger it could cause was dizziness, but to his knowledge that has not been reported.
"We took a lot of the samples to Jones & Henry Engineers, Ltd., a reputable testing lab in Bowling Green," Jankowski said. "That may cost us several thousands of dollars."
In the meantime, there were other sources available for clean drinking water for students, faculty and staff, Lockwood said.
"We had 20 portable water containers around those buildings in convenient places so people can use that for drinking and making coffee," Lockwood said.
"We try to do our best to make fresh, clean water available," he said, adding that there wasn't too much of an inconvenience caused, as the contaminated water was safe enough for other uses.
Both Jankowski and Lockwood said such an incident had never happened before.
"We don't think there was a serious risk," Lockwood said. "It's kind of Murphy's Law. Those things happened at the same time … it was just an unfortunate timing," he said.
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