“It’s a very bad situation we are in,” said Vince Chappell, manager of the water district. “We have a very large fire that is knocking on the back door, and if it makes it here, a large portion of the town would be burned.”
As evacuees fled the Seeley Lake area this past weekend, many turned on their lawn sprinklers out of desperation. And those who remain in town are saturating their yards. Meanwhile, firefighters are tapping into the same water supply to fill tanks and trucks for fighting the blaze.
The high demand for water since the 18,000-acre Jocko Lakes fire raced to within a mile of Seeley Lake Saturday has put a heavy burden on the community’s small water system, leaving few resources for firefighters to use if embers spark spot fires near town.
At issue is the decreased pressure in the town’s fire hydrants.
As a solution, Missoula County sheriff’s deputies will begin shutting off sprinklers at evacuees’ homes until pressure has been restored to the hydrants, Sheriff Mike McMeekin said Monday.
The situation is tricky at best, he said.
Homeowners have the right to leave their sprinklers running around their home. At the same time, the needs of the community as a whole trump the need of individual homeowners, Deputy County Attorney Mike Sehestedt said at a fire briefing Monday.
Law enforcement officers are discouraging excessive water use, but are not enforcing a mandatory restriction on water, McMeekin said. Conservation, moderation and cooperation are essential, he said.
On an average day, Seeley Lake residents consume 450,000 gallons of water. In the past two days, usage has jumped to 780,000 gallons a day, Chappell said.
“I’m right on the edge of maxing out my plant,” he said.
The problem is that as the fire gets closer, more people are going to want to protect their homes any way they can n including with garden hoses.
But not everyone can do that. Excessive use the past two days has left Seeley Lake resident Ed McCoy with no water at all. Normally, McCoy and his neighbors n who live on a hill northwest of town n experience dry pipes between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. daily.
The past two days, they’ve had no water at any time.
“We are being discriminated against,” said McCoy, who would also like to water the lawn around his home, let alone have some for drinking. “Everyone I know has their sprinkler on almost constantly now. You can’t blame them, but whether it helps or not is questionable.”
The shortage of water in Seeley Lake is not new.
When the Fox Fire Grill in Seeley caught fire earlier this spring, firefighters had trouble getting enough water to fight the blaze. That structure burned to the ground.
The town has outgrown its aged water system and Chappell is trying to secure grant money to install a new one next year. But the $4 million project is about $3 million short, he said.
Local and state agencies have donated money, but the federal government has so far declined the grant application, citing its growing budget deficit, Chappell said.
In the meantime, sheriff’s deputies will turn sprinklers off and on in neighborhoods in and around Seeley Lake in a staggered, cyclical fashion, McMeekin said. That way, the lawns of residents who left their sprinklers running won’t be totally dry.
“It is very labor intensive, but it will accomplish what needs to get accomplished,” he said. “We have competing needs right now. There’s not enough pressure. What else do we do?”
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