Do-not-drink water advisory lifted in Palos Verdes Estates

Residents of about 200 homes in Palos Verdes Estates were advised not to drink or cook with tap water from Monday night until Wednesday midday after maintenance workers discovered the locks had been broken on a remote water storage tank.

Although initial testing revealed no abnormalities, California Water Service told residents to avoid consuming water until a fresh supply was introduced into the distribution system. They sent notices door-to-door and also contacted individuals via e-mail and phone numbers on record.

Cal Water flushed hydrants and brought in fresh water. The advisory was lifted Wednesday after testing confirmed the water was safe.

“We issued this do-not-drink advisory out of an abundance of caution because protecting our customers’ health and safety is our highest priority,” the private utility said in a statement posted on its website.

Rumors of fecal matter in the water supply were false, the statement said.

The security breach was discovered during a routine maintenance check of the 50,000-gallon tank, said Yvonne Kingman, corporate communications manager at Cal Water.

Some storage sites are only required to be checked weekly, but inspectors had visited the tank in question less than a week before the broken locks were discovered. Kingman said that the environment “looked freshly disturbed,” indicating the breach happened shortly before the discovery.

The State Division of Drinking Water and local law enforcement are investigating the incident.

“We did have layers of security in place already,” Kingman said. “But we’re going to take a look at what additional security measures we need to put in place to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”

Cal Water is also working to calculate the monetary costs of the incident.

The storage tank has been isolated from the system and is still not in use, said Andrew DiLuccia, public information officer at the State Water Resources Control Board.

Residents were told they can be reimbursed for bottled water purchased during the advisory period by sending receipts to Cal Water’s customer center, 263 West 237^th Street, Torrance, CA 90505.