Power has been restored to WSSC Water’s Potomac Water Filtration Plant, but nearly 1.9 million customers in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties are still being asked to conserve water while the system recovers from Tuesday’s outage.
The plant returned to operation Tuesday afternoon and reached full production around 5:30 p.m., according to WSSC Water officials. But the utility said water storage across the system had been drawn down significantly during the outage, meaning the essential water use request remains in effect until further notice.
Officials said they hope to lift the restrictions before lunchtime Wednesday if storage levels recover as expected.
“I’ll feel more comfortable once we reach 105 [million gallons] in our system in terms of adequate firefighting protection and things of that nature,” WSSC Water Director of Production Ben Thompson said Tuesday evening.
The system had about 89 million gallons in storage at the time of the briefing. Thompson said WSSC Water hopes to reach between 125 million and 130 million gallons overnight, ahead of Wednesday morning’s peak demand.
The trouble began around 4:30 a.m. Tuesday at the Potomac plant, which produces roughly 70% to 75% of the water used by WSSC Water customers.
One of two electrical feeds serving the plant had already been taken offline while Pepco performed maintenance. The remaining feed then failed, knocking the plant offline.
Pepco restored the other electrical feed around noon, but WSSC Water officials said internal electrical problems, including ground faults, prevented the plant from immediately restarting.
Crews implemented a temporary workaround, allowing the plant to return to operation around 3:45 p.m. and eventually ramp back up to full production.
WSSC Water Deputy General Manager David McDonough said the utility has “no indication” the outage was caused by a cyberattack or other malicious activity.
“All indications are that this was the result of an infrastructure failure,” McDonough said.
For now, customers are still being asked to use water only when necessary, avoid outdoor water use and limit flushing toilets and running washing machines and dishwashers.
Officials stressed that the water remains safe to drink and there is no boil water advisory.
WSSC Water said the continued conservation is necessary to rebuild storage throughout its nearly 6,000-mile distribution system and maintain enough water for essential needs, including firefighting.
Officials expect the system to continue recovering overnight and will reevaluate the conservation request around Wednesday morning’s peak demand period.
“No boil water advisory or loss of service is imminent,” McDonough said. “The Potomac plant is operating and providing safe, clean drinking water to our system.”
WTOP’s Will Vitka, Liz Anderson and Anna Chen contributed to this report.
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