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10.11.2007: Do it yourself - the Water Tank Adventure
The photos probably say it all, but spending three hours doing this motivated me to put in some description! If you have never lived in a small, remote Canadian Arctic community, or somewhere like the island of Tarawa in the South Pacific*, then you've probably never lived with a water tank. You're bereft of the many wonders including running out of water mid-shower, waving down the guys that drive the water truck to get a re-fill, and the annual cleaning of the water tank. Deep awareness of water consumption practices have helped a great deal in maintaining a comfortable flow of water from our taps most of the time. ("If it's yellow, let it mellow.") It also helps that our tank is large enough to support a small family. We make mental notes of when the truck filled us up last, sometimes check the tank level before doing laundry, and always have fifty litres of water set aside for those days of winter blizzard when the water truck is not able to make its rounds. *I'm reading a humourous book at the moment, J. Maarten Troost - "The Sex Lives of Cannibals". True story: A young couple spends two years living on the South Pacific island of Tarawa and though it's worlds apart from Paulatuk, there are many funny points of commonality. This past fall, community-wide warnings were issued in Paulatuk regarding the discovery of fecal coliforms in our water supply. It was rumoured that the truck hose had been drug through one too many piles of dog poop. The water truck is regularly tested three times a week, and for the first time in a few years the test came back negative. This contamination indicates the possibility of harmful bacteria and viruses such as E-coli and hepatitis, and until the water was pronounced clean again all water for consumption needed to be boiled. This inevitably also lead to the need for all water tanks to be cleaned once the supply was cleaned, and so you know how we spent last Tuesday night shortly after getting back from our vacation. I don't recommend it - live vicariously through us on this one, trust me. It is suggested that water tanks are cleaned once a year. Ours hadn't been cleaned in at least six.
In the days leading up, we asked that the water tank not be re-filled until we phoned, and watched every day as the levels dropped until we felt we were ready to drain it completely. First we prepared for the event, anticipating that, as with all things in the north, it may be a few days before we could get our tank filled again; this, plus the fact that in order to clean the tank we would be needing some water. We filled our bathtub and every large pot and bucket we have in the house, then we let what was left run through the taps. At about 8pm the water flow stopped, but when the flow stops there is still a significant amount of water left in the tank. We spent the next hour using buckets to bring the water from the tank to the toilet. With about an inch of water left, I crawled down into the abyss. At first it was difficult to believe that someone would actually have to fit inside there! The tank holds about 2200 litres of water, and is about 70-80cm tall on the inside. The entry hole is maybe 50cm in diameter. If you are even the least bit claustrophobic, this is not for you. I donned my bathing cap, gritted my teeth and slipped inside. Crouching on my hands and knees and crawling in an inch of water, I could barely lift my head. My headlamp was my only light and revealed a dark layer of fine sediment coating the floor and walls of the tank. I scrubbed while Markus remained outside and soaked up the rest of the water towel by towel, wringing the water into a bucket and carrying it away. This was painfully slow, as you can imagine.
Surprisingly, mucky though it was, the smell down there in the murky water was far from disgusting. In fact, it smelled like a lake-side beach after the rain. On occassion I noticed a miniscule snail shell, but otherwise only fine, fine silt. I scrubbed and crawled and imagined the article I would write, the people who might read it, and thought of the heat, bugs and gunk in a water tank on Tarawa. This was decidedly pleasant in comparison, though far from entertaining. After scrubbing it down and wiping it out with towels, I went back through scrubbing with a bucket of water and bleach. In total I spent two hours crawling around in the tank; behold the transformation. Markus tried his hand at joining me and got stuck as he tried to wriggle down, it looked so funny I had to take a photo. He eventually made it.
We made an excellent team, draining and carrying, toweling and scrubbing, changing water and laughing! My knees were bruised for a few days following, but thankfully we no longer need to boil all our water. -Delia
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