Water concerns close 3 more W.Va. schools
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CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) – For the second-straight day, multiple West Virginia schools sent students home because of a smell resembling that from a chemical spill that tainted the water of 300,000 people for days.
The licorice odor prompted five schools to close since Wednesday in Kanawha County, the site of a Jan. 9 spill.
The scent is persisting weeks after officials said the nine affected counties were clear to drink or otherwise use their tap water. Federal health officials even said Thursday that pregnant women could drink it, backtracking on a previous advisory.
Watts, J.E. Robins, and Overbrook elementary schools dismissed early Thursday. The three schools are getting their pipes flushed and water tested again before making a decision about whether to hold classes today.
At Riverside High and Midland Trail Elementary schools Wednesday, students and teachers felt light-headed and had itchy eyes and noses from the smell. One teacher fainted and a student went to the hospital. The schools closed in the morning and didn’t reopen Thursday.
Follow-up tests at Riverside and Midland Trail didn’t detect the chemical in their running water. But several rounds of earlier tests also didn’t detect the chemical at the two schools. The schools are awaiting one more set of test results before deciding if they will open today.
Elsewhere, a U.S. House committee has announced who will testify Monday during a Charleston hearing on West Virginia’s chemical spill. The 9 a.m. meeting will take place at the Kanawha County Courthouse. The witness list includes the president of West Virginia American Water, state health, homeland security and environmental officials, the chairman of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board and county emergency and homeland security officials.
Freedom Industries President Gary Southern has been invited.
Two W.Va. members sit on the committee: Nick Rahall, the committee’s top Democrat, and Republican Shelley Moore Capito.
A U.S. Senate committee took testimony about the chemical spill in Washington, D.C., Tuesday.