A water main break near Morrison Road and Benson Court knocked water pressure below safe levels in part of New Orleans East on Thursday morning, triggering a precautionary boil water advisory for residents along several major corridors in the Little Woods area. It is the second such advisory to hit the area in less than a week.
According to the Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans, pressures in the affected zone fell below 20 pounds per square inch because of the break, prompting crews to respond to both fix the pipe and bring pressure back to normal. The agency said crews were working to make the repair and restore service as quickly as possible.
The advisory, issued as of 8:10 a.m. Thursday, covers a wide swath of the neighborhood. It stretches along St. Charles Canal, including Cove Drive, Crestmont Road and Danube Road, from I-10 to Lincoln Beach Boulevard and Hayne Boulevard, NOLA.com reports, citing Sewerage and Water Board officials.
Which Streets Are Covered
The boil water zone also extends along Lincoln Beach Boulevard and Hayne Boulevard from St. Charles Canal to Paris Road, and continues down Paris Road from that intersection to the north I-10 service road. A fourth stretch covers the north I-10 service road itself, running from Paris Road back to Cove Drive, closing the loop around the affected section of Little Woods.
SWBNO is advising residents within those boundaries to use bottled or boiled water for drinking, cooking, brushing teeth and mixing baby formula until the advisory is lifted, per the agency's boil water guidance. The utility notes that a precautionary advisory like this one usually lasts at least 24 hours, since that is how long it takes to test the water for safety.
A Rough Week for the Neighborhood
This marks the second time in less than a week that part of New Orleans East has been placed under a boil water advisory, according to WDSU. The earlier advisory had since been lifted before Thursday's water main break prompted a new one.
The repeated advisories echo a broader pattern in the area. Neighborhoods in New Orleans East, including Little Woods, often encounter low water pressure that falls below safe levels, a dynamic that NOLA.com has linked to the area's distance of nearly 30 miles from the Carrollton Water Purification Plant. Other parts of the city have dealt with similar issues recently, including a boil water advisory issued for the Memorial Park neighborhood on the West Bank, which remained in effect after bacteria turned up in a water sample there, NOLA.com has reported separately.
For now, residents along the affected stretch of Little Woods are being told to stick with bottled or boiled water while SWBNO crews work the repair near Morrison Road and Benson Court and monitor pressure across the system.
