How does Grand Prairie handle contamination? Bottled water, baby wipes and dirty dishes

GRAND PRAIRIE — Steven Hernandez couldn’t wait any longer. The 17-year-old grabbed a stack of towels and soap and headed out in his family’s minivan with his mother and three sisters Thursday morning, desperate for a hot shower.

“This felt really, really good,” Hernandez said as he left the Tony Shotwell Life Center in Grand Prairie, which offered free showers this week. “I’m just worried how long this is going to last.”

Two days after a foam agent used to fight fires contaminated the city’s water supply, Grand Prairie residents were left to struggle with bottled water, baby wipes and packaged foods.

The contamination, which occurred on Tuesday, affected about 60,000 Grand Prairie residents who live north of Interstate 20. Residents are urged not to drink, bathe, cook, brush teeth, or wash dishes and clothes in the tap water. Boiling the water does not help.

City officials say they don’t know how long the warning will remain in effect and are awaiting approval from state environmental regulators. Schools in Grand Prairie are closed, as are many restaurants in the contaminated zone. On Wednesday, a spokesman for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, which tests the water, declined to give a timeline.

Hernandez, who attends Dubiski Career High School, said his family has made several trips to the grocery store to fill gallon bottles with water so they can brush their teeth and wash their hands. For dinner, they grab pizza and try not to dirty the dishes.

“It was a real pain,” he said. “We’ll feel better when this is all over.”

Marileysis Longoria, who lives with her husband and 1-year-old son, spent the past two days driving between her home in Grand Prairie and her aunt’s house in Arlington, where she takes showers, washes baby bottles and prepares meals.

However, that didn’t prevent what she believes was a near-disaster: Longoria glanced at her son as he was dipping his hand into the toilet water, causing her and her husband to panic.

“It makes us nervous. The baby gets involved in everything,” said Longoria, 24. “We started scrubbing his hands with bottled water.”

Longoria is not the only one to report a near miss. Her sister, who also lives in Grand Prairie, said she absentmindedly brushed her teeth with tap water.

On a Grand Prairie Facebook page, residents shared recommendations for their favorite baby and bath towels, and one resident said they covered bathroom and kitchen faucets with plastic cups as a reminder.

Grand Prairie Mayor Ron Jensen said the city has not received any reports of illness, nor has there been an increase in emergency calls.

City officials first received reports of foamy tap water late Tuesday afternoon, and they worked with state environmental officials to determine the source: It was foam that had been used to extinguish a fire at an industrial warehouse earlier in the day.

Firefighters used foam to fight the blaze, which was made more difficult by hoard-like conditions inside the warehouse in the Great Southwest Industrial District. Contaminants were leaking into the water supply through backflow.

The firefighting foam is from the Micro-Blaze brand, which touts itself as being environmentally friendly. According to its website and city officials, it does not contain PFAS, a group of synthetic chemicals known as “forever chemicals” because they do not break down in the environment.

Foaming agents can give water a bitter, oily taste, a cloudy appearance and a murky smell. High doses can cause gastrointestinal problems if ingested. Some Grand Prairie residents said their water looked normal, others said it was cloudy or foamy.

Reuben Nigo, 52, who lives in Grand Prairie, said he doesn’t drink the water but showers and brushes his teeth normally.

“It can’t be worse than what we drank as kids,” Nigo said.

Others were not quite so relaxed. Diana Osborn said she has relied on prepared foods since learning about the problem and drives to a grocery store outside the contaminated zone to avoid fruits and vegetables that may have been rinsed in contaminated water. She said she has spent more on groceries in the past two days than she would in a normal week.

“This creates a financial problem,” Osborn said.

On Thursday, Valerie Varga, 31, and her husband Jacob, 30, drove to the Tony Shotwell Life Center with their three daughters, ages 4, 5 and 11, to take much-needed showers. The family has been using bottled water to cook Frito chili pie this week, but with no way to wash dishes, the kitchen sink is overflowing with dirty bowls and plates.

Varga said she was becoming increasingly concerned about how long the warning would last and the health of her family. Shortly before her husband learned of the contamination, he was taking a shower at his home in Grand Prairie.

“I’m fine,” said Jacob Varga, shrugging. “So far.”