Iowa water quality concerns amid shortages and rising nitrate levels

Water is something many of us take for granted, but thousands of Iowa residents have experienced contaminated water and shortages this summer.

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Iowa’s Water Crisis: Shortages and Dangerous Nitrate Levels Affecting Thousands

  • Regional Water General Manager Tom Kallman says it is now pumping water from Council Bluffs to its customers in eastern Pottawattamie County. That doesn’t mean, though, everything’s back to normal.
  • “Most of the calls in the last couple weeks that we got were from people who were asking if they could fill their pools for the 4th of July and I was the Grinch who basically stole Independence Day because I told them ‘no,'” Kallman said.
  • Atlantic farmers Denise O’Brien and Larry Harris are teaching neighbors to test the waterways, which ultimately filter into our drinking water systems. They’ve been concerned since the ’70s: “That’s when we first came across the term ‘blue baby’ … It’s when the nitrates rob babies of oxygen,” said “O’Brien.

BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Water: how often do you give it a second thought? For thousands of Iowa neighbors, it isn’t something they can take for granted…

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