Puerto Rican Residents Are Being Pumped Water From Contaminated Site

Puerto Rican Residents Are Being Pumped Water From Contaminated Site

It’s been over three weeks since Hurricane Maria ripped through Puerto Rico, leaving much of the island in wreckage and without power…and still today, 35% of the island’s inhabitants do not have safe drinking water.

This has led water authorities in the area to desperate measures — pumping water to residents from a hazardous waste facility due to sheer lack of options.

CNN has discovered through documentation and on-site observation that the Puerto Rican water utility, Autoridad de Acueductos y Alcantarillados (AAA) has been distributing water from a well at the Dorado Groundwater Contamination Site to residents for drinking and bathing. The site was listed in 2016 as a site specifically for hazardous waste cleanup.

The area is known to be polluted with industrial chemicals such as tetrachloroethylene and trichloroethylene, which are proven health risks that affect the liver and are linked to the development of cancer.

However, residents are willingly going to retrieve the water with knowledge that it is from a potentially dangerous area, claiming that they really have no other option at this point.

SMH! Puerto Rico needs MUCH more help than some of our authorities want to recognize.

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