Kibkom North Cyprus Forum

Anyone else really concerned to read 40 water storage depots in 40 schools tested positive for E. coli and it is possible that the source is Turkish water from the Reservoir.
Where do you go to get the water in your own tanks tested ? and can you rely on the tests done ?

I didn't know about the schools testing for E. coli, but I have wondered why so many households who now have the "good" Turkish water are still using the delivered bottled water. Is the Turkish imported water safe to drink? is it tested? I've heard it's stored in a large open reservoir, but wonder if the water is then purified prior to distribution into the municipal water system?

kayc wrote:.... I've heard it's stored in a large open reservoir, but wonder if the water is then purified prior to distribution into the municipal water system?

This is the vital point; I'm sure that many countries (including the UK) store their water in open reservoirs, but stringent purification procedures prior to distribution are in place.
However, even if these purification procedures are in place here, was the already existing distribution system (pipe network) cleansed and sterilised before distribution of the "Turkish" water?
I must admit that I still buy the "delivered" water; additionally, I now have a switchable system that permits either direct mains feed to my taps or feed to my storage tank with pumped feed to my taps - I intend to (normally) use the tank/pumped option to ensure that the tank is constantly "refreshed", with the standby option of switching to "direct" mains feed if/when electricity fails and the pump is therefore inoperative....

Further to jofra's post...

A large percentage of homes and businesses store the piped water in a 'depot' (storage tank) of some kind - perhaps a 1 or 2 ton metal tank, a 10 ton underground tank, or a large plastic tank.

The stored water is then pumped out as needed for use, but is susceptible to contamination by birds, vermin, cockroaches, general debris, etc. during the storage period.

So, even if the water delivered from the supply is potable, after it has been stored in a relatively insanitary tank, it most certainly isn't!

Add to this, the storage tank on your roof or in your loft - the water in these tanks spends even longer 'festering away' (lovely thought ) and is only drawn off by gravity feed when the domestic pump fails to act - such as during a power cut...

It is advisable to take steps to periodically disinfect/chlorinate your tanks, but even then, DON'T drink the stored water!

Regarding the water piped by the Belediye, there is a statutory requirement for it to be potable at point of supply to the consumer's premises, and (in the UK, at least) this is normally achieved by chlorination to a level of up to 10 times the level desired, on the basis that most of the chlorine will have been 'used up' en route combatting contaminants in the pipework etc,. resulting in a level of no more than 1 part per million at the consumer's premises. I understand that Belediyes (claim to) routinely test and treat the water as necessary, and issue alerts if the water is found to be unsafe.

All premises are supposed to have at least one tap (usually in the kitchen, although it can be elsewhere) which delivers water direct from the piped supply mains.

Incidentally, I'm not sure where the idea of 'CLEAN Turkish water' has come from - it may have a lower ph, and contain less dissolved minerals (not, in itself, necessarily a good thing for your heart!) but I really can't see why it would be considered to be 'cleaner' - I would have thought that it comes from the same sort of environment as normal TRNC water - unless anyone knows better!

KC, some houses (and we have one) were built in such a hurry in the early 2000"s that no facility was made for one tap to be contacted to the mains, so all water in our place comes from the surface tanks in the garden then pumped on the roof. However the builders installed a third tap on the kitchen sink which turned out to be for "show" only i.e. connected to nothing!!

Anything that keeps the bowels moving is fine by me.

sophie wrote:KC, some houses (and we have one) were built in such a hurry in the early 2000"s that no facility was made for one tap to be contacted to the mains, so all water in our place comes from the surface tanks in the garden then pumped on the roof. However the builders installed a third tap on the kitchen sink which turned out to be for "show" only i.e. connected to nothing!!

Our builder was a bit 'miffed' that we didn't want a 'Belediye tap' in the kitchen - I was thinking off the intermittent nature of the supply at the time - and he compromised by insisting that one of the taps in the garden was connected to the mains supply, and when you say 'pumped up to the roof', once the roof tank is full, then the pump simply maintains the pressure in the system - that water in the roof tank isn't touched unless there's a power cut...

Hi Keith, I wasn't aware that the roof water tank doesn't supply water all the time, if we have a power cut we do not get any gravity fed water it all stops straight away, I assume we must have a problem and this should not happen?

gary&shirley wrote:Hi Keith, I wasn't aware that the roof water tank doesn't supply water all the time, if we have a power cut we do not get any gravity fed water it all stops straight away, I assume we must have a problem and this should not happen?

Yes, I think that you do...

The roof tank is fed from the pressurised system via a ballcock, which stops water flowing into the tank when it's full, and then allows water to flow back down under the influence of gravity via a non-return valve if the pressure in the system drops due to the pump not running.

Given the amount of debris that we get in the water supply and also the high limescale content, it will come as no surprise to learn that 'non-return' valves frequently turn into NOT-Return valves and won't allow water to flow in any direction!

3 years is about the maximum lifespan of a non-return valve in TRNC! - and while you've got someone attending to that, you might as well get 'em to replace the Pressure Relief valve on the hot tank as well, they're about 50TL a knock, and it could save you the price of a new hot water tank!

I was advised by a builder friends not to drink "Turkish Water" for a months or so after installation to allow time for it to clean the pipes - after seeing the pipes being laid it makes sense to me!!

I think when calling "Turkish" water clean they mean "soft" which is home to those of us from the wool mills of West Yorkshire. At least you can save money on the amount of soap products you use, and it is good for the complexion.

is there an article regarding this? i would be interested to know the effected schools if possible please as many of my neighbours have children in schools here. thanks

RR I quite agree about the softness of the water now. I use far less shampoo, detergent, soap in general than I used to do a few months back,

It was reported on LGC news, no schools were named but 40 of the 40 tested were positive which makes you wonder how widespread this contamination is. E. coli can be serious for the elderly and very young as it can cause kidney problems among other things. Although we may all drink bottled water we can become infected in so many other simpler ways rinsing cups, cleaning teeth etc, I am much more interested in how we can clean the storage tanks, how frequently and with what they should be treated, how frequently and where we should get the water stored in it tested.
If anyone knows the answer to these questions I would be very grateful

Loobyloo wrote:It was reported on LGC news, no schools were named but 40 of the 40 tested were positive which makes you wonder how widespread this contamination is. E. coli can be serious for the elderly and very young as it can cause kidney problems among other things. Although we may all drink bottled water we can become infected in so many other simpler ways rinsing cups, cleaning teeth etc, I am much more interested in how we can clean the storage tanks, how frequently and with what they should be treated, how frequently and where we should get the water stored in it tested.
If anyone knows the answer to these questions I would be very grateful

Loobylo, if you are really concerned, and want to be 100% safe, then: -

DO NOT use stored water to rinse cups, brush teeth, or wash salads!

I don't even use it for cooking...

There are far worse things than e coli lurking in the water - campylobacter for one, giardia and salmonella are another two - there are many more. Google them if you want to know more.

By all means disinfect both your ground tanks and roof tanks to try to prevent legionnaires disease (which can be contracted by breathing in contaminated water spray in the shower) - but be aware that they can become contaminated again within hours unless the tanks are kept disinfected. The issue is not so much the cleanliness of the water supplied by the Belediye, as what happens to it while it's sat in your tanks...

A suitable disinfectant is chlorine, present as Sodium Hypochlorite in ordinary household bleach - aim to keep the concentration at around 1 part per million (you can use a standard pool testing kit for this purpose).

As a rough guide. domestic bleach has a concentration of around 5% - that's 50,000 parts per million, so you can easily work out how much you will need for whatever sized tanks you have installed. The granular chlorine used for swimming pools is also suitable, again you would need to do the arithmetic to work out how much to use.

There isn't much point in having your stored water tested for pathogens, as it can become contaminated very soon after you have a test done - the safest way is to either use only the Belediye-supplied water 'straight from the tap', as it were (and NOT store any water in tanks at all), or to keep your stored water constantly chlorinated at the recommended level.

Never eat salads or fruit outside of your own home unless you are absolutely certain that they have been thoroughly washed in CLEAN water.

AND - always drink beer straight out of the bottle unless you take your own glass with you, never have ice in any drink unless you take it with you, gin and tonic can become interesting by taking a sip out of your own bottles one at a time, never have coffee or tea when out unless you take your own cups and provide the water for the making, sandwiches are really dangerous if the bread has been cut with a knife washed in normal water - the list is endless folks and unless you all want to turn into Howard Hughes people it is almost impossible to live a normal life. I agree most heartedly with a lot of the comments above but once you start down the slippery slope of worry there is no brake. Be careful, be cautious and be sensible, did you think about any of the above when in your home country? Water to the house still flows merrily through lead pipes into my friend's property in Lichfield, guess it will kill him one day but 72 years from starting to drink it he is still here!

Keithcaley wrote:

sophie wrote:KC, some houses (and we have one) were built in such a hurry in the early 2000"s that no facility was made for one tap to be contacted to the mains, so all water in our place comes from the surface tanks in the garden then pumped on the roof. However the builders installed a third tap on the kitchen sink which turned out to be for "show" only i.e. connected to nothing!!

Our builder was a bit 'miffed' that we didn't want a 'Belediye tap' in the kitchen - I was thinking off the intermittent nature of the supply at the time - and he compromised by insisting that one of the taps in the garden was connected to the mains supply, and when you say 'pumped up to the roof', once the roof tank is full, then the pump simply maintains the pressure in the system - that water in the roof tank isn't touched unless there's a power cut...

keith does your regulator maintain pressure in your hot water? I'm still on the dual float switch system so dont have a pressure regulator.

Kerry6138, yes, the whole system is pressurised by the house pump.

There is a pressure relief valve to cope with any 'over pressure' caused by expansion of the water when heated up.

Waddo, I was just trying to take Loobyloo's mind off the E coli !

I always make sure that my G & T is strong enough to kill any germs hiding in the ice

Keith,having read all your do's and don't I have decided I might just as well go and shoot myself as I must be on my last legs. The only thing I don't do is drink from the taps as all the water comes straight from tanks outside or on the roof. Otherwise I do and have done for 13 years everything you say we shouldn't do. However I do make ice cubes from bottled water. We do not EVER use the large containers of bottled water, having seen them standing outside in the full sun, and I eat loads and loads of salads at. various establishments around the island. Oh well, watch this space and don't bring me grapes unless they are the seedless variety, washed with bottled water.

Keith, "There are far worse things than e coli lurking in the water - campylobacter for one, giardia and salmonella are another two - there are many more. Google them if you want to know more." - Yep, that will do it, definitely take your mind of e coli - lol.

If you have lived here more than a month and survived I would suggest that you cease to worry about what is in the TRNC water, bet nobody worries about what is in the water in the South should they ever venture across the green line and have a cup of coffee. We are a very resilient animal when it comes down to it - the quantity of Efes consumed proves that - so don't worry too much, just take a little care. If it looks funny, smells funny or tastes funny then don't drink it - works for me, so far! Wonder what they water the grapes with???? You have to laugh.

As John Mortimer said every Birth Certificate should be printed with a Health Warning:

"Just Living Kills you in the end"

"Dear All" ...

Thank you for your concern and advice, but it's not me that's worrying, is it?

In case you didn't notice, my post was directed at Loobyloo, and I prefaced my remarks with the phrase

"Loobylo, if you are really concerned, and want to be 100% safe, then: -"

I am quite aware that just getting out of bed in the morning comes with a set of risks that far outweigh those posed by the local water supply; I was simply addressing the points raised in Loobyloo's post.

Remember:

Life is a sexually transmitted disease which is invariably fatal.

kayc wrote:I didn't know about the schools testing for E. coli, but I have wondered why so many households who now have the "good" Turkish water are still using the delivered bottled water. Is the Turkish imported water safe to drink? is it tested? I've heard it's stored in a large open reservoir, but wonder if the water is then purified prior to distribution into the municipal water system?

I was told by the security guard at the reservoir that the water from Turkey goes straight into the system after treatment and that the water in the reservoir is just a strategic reserve. Whether that means it is fit to drink I don't know. Try it and see.

Ref message 9. Hi Keith many thanks for your comment, I went on the roof this morning to have a look at the system and found that the cold water tank out valve had been switched off. We had a new hot water tank fitted last summer so presumably they must have turned it off at the time and forgot to turn it back on, I've turned it on now and we get some water when the pump is switched off, not a lot but certainly more than before, again many thanks for your comment.

Just to repeat my suggestion above that you wait a few weeks before drinking the Turkish water direct from the tap. Whatever the conditions of the water, the pipes are likely to be dirty and it will take a while to wash them through.

If you do try the new water direct and drop dead please let us know I used to drink "tap water " but perhaps illogically I am uneasy about the newkind. Buying bottled water is a d****** nuisance as I cant lift the large bottles and have to carry several small bottles at a time!

RR, like you we can't lift the large water bottles any longer and use the medium sized ones now. It works just fine in the water cooler and we top up as and when. Just wait, the people who bang on about the large water bottles, will get to our age one day!!!

Thanks Sophie , but I dont understand how you top up the water cooler , mine takes a 19 litre bottle, and I can see no way of filling it up?????????

I can just about lift the 5litre , but cant carry them any distance (like from the car to the kitchen)) or hold them to pour into another container.

Fortunately I have good Cypriot friends who change the cooler water for me, and will deliver smaller bottles, but Iwould really prefer to be independent as far as I can and not rely on them so much.

Reverting to the hard versus soft water point, I am hoping that the softer (I understand that only distilled water is truly soft without any mineral deposits-) will result in less furring up with limescale in pipes, kettles, taps etc. Any of the experts got any comments or advice on this?

By the way, where does bottled water come from - Cyprus or Turkey ? Fjor fizzy water I drink Highland Spring from Bonny Scotland, but its too expensive fo r "normal" use.

Ragged Robin wrote:Thanks Sophie , but I dont understand how you top up the water cooler , mine takes a 19 litre bottle, and I can see no way of filling it up?????????

I can just about lift the 5litre , but cant carry them any distance (like from the car to the kitchen)) or hold them to pour into another container.

Fortunately I have good Cypriot friends who change the cooler water for me, and will deliver smaller bottles, but Iwould really prefer to be independent as far as I can and not rely on them so much.

use a funnel to top large bottle with enough water that you can lift.

Ragged Robin wrote:
By the way, where does bottled water come from - Cyprus or Turkey ? Fjor fizzy water I drink Highland Spring from Bonny Scotland, but its too expensive fo r "normal" use.

I've seen some bottled water businesses, and I just assumed considering the relatively low cost of the jugs of water that is sold, and the still numerous companies delivering water that it must be locally drawn from a well here in Cyprus, and boiled or chemically treated to provide safe clean drinking water. I do think they recycle the containers.

I never know which bottled water to buy, but a couple of locals have said "don't buy EVSU" but couldn't say why.

Probably because their relatives own or work for the others!

Bloody Cyprus rumour mill in full flight as usual... another favourite is Alpet Petrol is dirty and K-Pet is clean - now I wonder who puts that rumour about? Oh... no, surely not..

Ask yourself which refinery the petrol comes from? Do they have their own one (not a very common practice in the oil world) they normally all have petrol refined in a refinery supplying all the different re-sellers... so how do they only supply dirty petrol to Alpet - answer - they don't but ask a local and they will hand on heart swear that there is a difference...

Yes a particular outlet might have a problem if their bulk tanks are compromised but it's not based on the fuel going in. But don't let that stop them... repeat the myth often enough and it passes into the 'truth' as perceived by the masses.

With water - at various times producers have been temporarily closed due to production issues... now who remembers the mass poisoning of folk in the UK's south west when chemicals passed into the domestic water supply? Not that long ago either... Yeah that's right, you remember. with mains supplies in the UK it's difficult to avoid using tap water to drink and cook with - hmm here - not so much.

I for one am very happy with the water and the regular checks undertaken - I'm not sure the same can be said for the UK.