‘It is nuts’: Some Manor residents wake up to brown, murky water for second time this year

MANOR, Texas (KXAN) – When some in Manor, Texas, got ready for work Monday morning, they turned on their taps and were met with brown, murky water flowing from their faucets.

“It is nuts, it is really nuts,” said Phil Stone, who moved to Manor from Florida with his wife 18 months ago.

Stone said this is the second time this occurred since moving to his new home.

“It’s a real pain,” he said. “I think every place has some challenges with water, but we’ve never had something where you walk in, turn the water on and it looks brown and ugly and no one tells you anything about it.”

Stone said he and his wife were not alerted about the situation, causing them to potentially consume some early Monday morning.

“I woke up this morning, we ran the water for coffee and put it in the coffee maker,” he said. “I have no idea if I was drinking that brown stuff or not – and that’s really upsetting.”

Crossroads Utility Services provides water to Stone’s subdivision. A representative told KXAN that a main was broken due to some maintenance activity over the weekend.

The representative told us that they generally do not send out mass communication, but the company has a 24-hour call center to respond to customer’s concerns. They said an operator was sent out to resolve the issue.

In order to clear out the murky water, homeowners must run their water. Crossroads Utility Services said it would refund customers for any additional water used.

“Main breaks and brown water are not very uncommon problems in water distribution,” said Keisuke Ikehata, Assistant Professor of Civil Engineering at Texas State University.

“Everybody’s coming into Central Texas, we have so much going on – so much construction,” he continued. “That causes some disruption to that water distribution system.”

While brown water occasionally is not atypical, he advised people not to ingest it.

“You certainly do not want to drink brown water because it may contain some elevated levels of constituents that could potentially make you sick,” Ikehata said.

“Brown water is actually coming from inside the pipe – the sediments and rust that build-up,” he continued.

Stone said he just wishes he would have been alerted to the issues with his water.

“I’m 72 so I don’t know what challenges might affect me,” he said. “What concerns me more is my one-year-old grandson who [lives] about a block and a half away. You know, it could really be something that affects his life.”

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