Dr. Michelle Minihan:

The incident at Gorey was notified to the EPA on the evening of 26 August. There was a short power failure and a chlorine pump failure on the evening of 19 August, seven days previously. The power outage which caused the chlorine pumps to fail was not recognised on the evening of 19 August. On 20 and 22 August, that is, the Friday and the Sunday, operational staff at the plant were there but the disinfection malfunction was not addressed and it was not escalated for attention within Wexford County Council or to Irish Water. Additional alarms were activated at another part of the plant, the dissolved air flotation unit, on Saturday, 21 August. They were not responded to or escalated for action. On Monday, 23 August, it was recognised that there was a problem with the chlorine dosing system. Contact was made with a contractor to attend site, and they duly attended on 24 August and fixed the issue. For those five days, from the evening of 19 August until the unit was fixed on 24 August, inadequately disinfected water was entering into the supply in the Gorey network. That was not reported or escalated within Wexford County Council. Reports of illness and discolouration in the water began on 22 August. There was initially one report of illness on 22 August. That was investigated by Irish Water which called to the complainant and took a sample at their house. At that time, Wexford County Council did not look at the operations at the treatment plant. However, on foot of a second report of illness on the morning of 26 August, Wexford County Council management staff investigated further, recognised that there had been an issue with the chlorine system over the previous five days, 19 to 24 August, and immediately contacted Irish Water by lunchtime on 26 August. That risk assessment around the impact to water quality was undertaken by Irish Water and Wexford County Council on the afternoon of 26 August and the consultation with the HSE was held sometime later that evening. The EPA was notified later that evening as well. The notification stated that the chlorination system had returned to satisfactory operation since 24 August.