Fire Chief Saves Water, Watches House Burn : Slick Puts Ohio Town Under Siege

With a slow-moving, 70-mile-long oil slick poisoning the Ohio River--their picturesque water supply--the last thing the 27,000 residents of this steelmaking city needed Thursday was a fire.

Officials had stopped filling water tanks Wednesday and, with less than two days’ supply on hand, were urging strict conservation measures to allow time to test a souped-up method of purifying water drawn from the river.

Thus, when flames burst from a red frame house at mid-day Thursday, Fire Chief John Mencer used some water from trucks but “basically let it burn,” he conceded in an interview as the occupants wept.

Mencer claimed that “We couldn’t have saved the building anyway,” but a neighbor, Dayle Grimm, disagreed.

“I know we’re up-tight about water,” she said, “but when somebody’s house is on the line, I think there should be exceptions.”

String of Communities

Five days after a million gallons of diesel fuel spilled from a ruptured holding tank into the Monongahela River near Pittsburgh, Steubenville became the latest in a string of communities falling under tense siege as the slick flowed into the Ohio River and headed for the Mississippi.

The oil--which contains cancer-causing benzene--was becoming increasingly diluted and all water utilities upstream of Steubenville have been able to resume pumping from the river after shutting down and briefly depleting reserves.

Nevertheless, a growing case of jitters gripped residents here, as well as 15,000 others in the vicinity who use water treated by the city.

Federal and state agencies prepared to send in military water trucks and barges bearing water tanks if the city’s experimental use of heavy doses of activated charcoal and bentonite clay failed to filter out pollutants down to federally required levels.

“This could be tight,” City Manager Bruce Williams said, as he sweated out results of the purification tests, due hours before reserves were expected to run dry this morning.

But at 10 p.m. Thursday, Williams ordered the closure of all non-essential businesses and asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to release water at a lock upstream to speed movement of the slick.

City Councilman Jerome Hagerty said the slick was “stagnantly hanging over our intake valves,” forcing curtailment of filtration efforts.

Throughout Thursday, car washes and Laundromats closed down, restaurants agreed to use paper plates, supermarkets brought in cases of bottled water and city workers on a telephone hot line urged citizens to take sponge baths, forgo laundering and dishwashing, and cook frozen foods instead of steamed vegetables.

Williams’ aide Deborah A. Welsch told one caller: “If you can wait to flush every two or three times--I know it sounds gross--but we want you to do it.”

Keeps Schools Open

Although water-short suburbs south of Pittsburgh closed schools earlier this week, Steubenville kept its open under the theory that students would use more water at home than they would under supervision at school.

Outside the Green Mill Restaurant downtown, owner Rae Sotraidis posted a sign advising that “Due to the water problems, we are using styro and plastic today” for setting tables.

“Normally, we use china, but I feel we can do our bit by not using our dishwasher any more than we have to,” Sotraidis said.

She was bitter, however, about the spill from a 40-year-old Ashland Oil Co. tank that had been moved and reassembled without being granted a permit by authorities in Allegheny County, Pa.

“I think the powers that be should be a little more on top of these storage tanks and have better regulations,” she said. “I have to adhere to a lot of regulations, and I think they should, too.”

For some facilities, conserving water was particularly trying.

Joseph Lancia, administrator of the Country Club Manor nursing home on Lovers Lane, said: “We’re trying not to wash residents’ personal clothes unless we really have to. We’re giving showers and baths only when necessary. We’re using paper plates, dishes and cups so we don’t have to wash them. We can survive for a while, but if we run out of water, I don’t know what we’ll do.”

In twin moves aimed at both public relations and profit, the Kroger supermarket at Hollywood Plaza was giving away bottled water on the one hand and selling it on the other. Customers flocked to pick up 120,000 free gallon plastic jugs of water filled by Kroger’s dairy at a distant water source. But shoppers generally passed up the option of also selecting from the 1,000 cases of commercial bottled water being sold at 99 cents a gallon.

“We’re not at the panic stage yet,” explained John Monroe, who added that he was conserving, nevertheless.

“I’m using an electric razor instead of a blade,” he said. “I might take a quick shower instead of a sponge bath, though, because I’m quite active in civic work, and I can’t go around smelling too bad.”

Wheeling, W. Va., where the slick arrived Thursday night, had made even more extensive preparations than Steubenville.

Well Water, Tanker Barges

With only a six-hour reserve in its tanks, the city of 60,000 strung two water lines across bridges to Ohio communities willing to lend well water, if necessary, and lined up four tanker barges to bring emergency supplies.

“We even have two swimming pools filled at the Civic Center, in case we need them,” said City Manager Mike Nau.

The city’s water intake pipes only go down 12 to 14 feet below the surface of the river. The oil slick, which originally went only six inches deep, now has been churned as deep as 28 feet, near the bottom of the river.