Philippines; Metropolis Suffers Water Shortage Crisis
Residents and businesses suffer from water service interruption for few days as of writing when supply was suddenly cut off without notice in some areas in Metro Manila and nearby cities. The crisis was due to La Mesa Dam, one of the major sources of water for Metro Manila, reached critical level at the onset of the el niño phenomenon.
It was reported that many has died or situations were worsened due to the absence of water supply. Rations were delivered in the areas affected prioritizing hospitals. Other condominiums have resorted to fetching water from the pools for their tenants after few days of lack or no supply. Amid complaints in these areas, normal water pressure were maintained in the larger areas of the Metro.
Manila Water, the supplier, denied allegations that the shortage was due to ‘manipulation’ of water supply. It was, as earlier mentioned, due to the major source reaching critical level of 68.93m above sea level, the lowest in 12 years. Normal level is 80m.
In lieu of this, Maynilad, another water supplying company, expressed willingness to share their supply to address the demands. In addition, Magat dam, the largest source of water, is said to be at the normal level but still not sufficient to fulfill high demands in the summer season. The said water service interruption is likely to last until June due to the high demands further aggravated by the drought.
However, the experts from the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System and the weather bureau are not convinced that el niño was the cause of the problem as the data they gathered doesn’t support the supplier’s claim. On the other hand, the government is eyeing increasing the number of water pumps to help alleviate the problem. As of now, everybody is urged to conserve water and use it wisely.
Is this a direct effect of climate change or just as what was alleged ‘manipulation’? The population hopes that investigation be conducted fairly, but more than that, everyone hopes that water supply will be back to normal soon.
Let’s talk with aimtalk teachers:
- Imagine water supply is cut off for just one day, what are the likely effects of the service interruption?
- Have you ever experienced water shortage or crisis? What was the cause of it? How did you deal with it? How about the government?
- It is claimed that Mars might contain water, thus, life could be possible there. In case this is true, would you be interested to go to Mars? Why or why not?
Vocabulary
amid(prep): while noisy, or confused events are happening
in lieu of: instead of
address(v): start trying to solve
aggravate(v): make a bad situation worse
alleviate(v): make something less difficult to deal with
conduct(v): carry out
