Residents asked to conserve water after plant power outage

Residents of Lorain, Sheffield Lake, Sheffield Township, Amherst Township and Amherst are being asked to conserve water this morning.

According to Lorain Safety-Service Director Robert Fowler, power went out at Lorain’s water plant over night, forcing the plant to run on a generator.

Power is back up now, he said, but the plant is still having some difficulties getting fully operational.

“We’re asking people to conserve water until things get up and operational,” he said.

Water pressure isn’t low at this point, he said, adding “that’s what we’re trying to prevent.”

“The idea is that if we conserve now we won’t run into a situation where there’s low water pressure,” he said. “At no time was anybody in danger, but if there’d been a fire, flows would have been lower than what we would hope for for firefighting operations.”

Tom Kelley, Lorain County emergency management and homeland security director, added “don’t run your dishwasher, don’t run your washer.”