MONROE COUNTY, Michigan — The Monroe County Health Department announced that water sampling is available to Whiteford Township residents impacted by the diesel fuel leak.
Beginning April 5 at 1 p.m., residents who get their water from a private residential well can call the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services at 844-934-1315 to schedule an appointment for water sampling free of charge. Appointments can be made Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. until April 12, according to the MCHD.
Residents who call to schedule an appointment will be asked to provide their name, address, phone number and email address and answer questions about any water treatment or filtration systems they have.
If water treatment is connected to the home's water supply, arrangements will need to be made during the appointment scheduling process and homeowners will need to grant sampling teams permission to access their property and collect a sample from inside their home.
The sample may be collected from an outside faucet if there is no treatment or filtration and the outside faucet comes from the same source as the well. The owner's presence at home is not necessary in these cases.
Bulk drinking water is also available to residents at the Whiteford Volunteer Fire Department Station.
The MCHD says results from the rest round of water sampling are "considered ‘clean’ or non-detect."
“The initial sampling results from the high priority areas are encouraging, meaning that we are not seeing any contaminants in drinking water. That being said, we understand the health and safety concerns for those residents outside of the initial sampling area. With Pilot support, a plan is in place to expand water sampling to include any resident of Whiteford Township who wants their private residential well water tested,” said Chris Westover, environmental health director for the MCHD.
The county confirmed that the cause of the spill was due to a leak of a diesel tank underneath a Pilot gas station in Ottawa Lake that resulted in leakage contaminating the North Branch of the Ottawa River.