WTF Is Happening in the Flint Water Crisis, Explained

Were there red flags early on?
Yes. General Motors still has manufacturing facilities in Flint. In October 2014, worried the water would corrode auto parts, the company brokered a deal to switch its own water supply back to Lake Huron water.

Hold up. The water quality wasn’t good enough for industrial purposes, but people were still drinking it? And no one was advocating a switch back to Detroit water?
In fact, city council members in Flint appealed to the emergency manager to switch back to Detroit water way back in January 2015. Detroit even offered to waive re-connection fees. The request was denied; it would cost too much.

When was the lead problem discovered?
The University of Michigan-Flint found high lead levels on campus in January 2015. 

By February, the first home in Flint tested positive for elevated lead levels — at nearly seven times the EPA’s limit.

By April, Flint children started testing positive for lead linked to corroded plumbing.

Are Flint city employees blameless here?
The crisis began under state rule but played out under local control; Flint exited state receivership in April 2015. However, a state task force has laid “primary responsibility for what happened in Flint” at the feet of Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality, or MDEQ.

Was the EPA asleep at the switch?
Not entirely. By February 2015, the EPA was interrogating MDEQ, asking if corrosion controls were in place in Flint’s water system. The state told the EPA that it had a corrosion plan in place. But this wasn’t true. Lime was being added to “soften” the water. State officials seemed to believe this would make the water less corrosive. In fact, it may have made it more so.

By early summer, the EPA had a good handle on the problem. One employee sounded the alarm in a memo dated June 24, 2015: “A major concern from a public health standpoint is the absence of corrosion control treatment,” he wrote. “Recent drinking water sample results indicate the presence of high lead results in the drinking water…. The lack of any mitigating treatment for lead is of serious concern for residents that live in homes with lead service lines… which are common throughout the City of Flint.”

In July, the state of Michigan nonetheless advised Flint residents not to worry: “Anyone who is concerned about lead in the drinking water in Flint can relax,” MDEQ’s then-spokesman said. “It does not look like there is any broad problem with the water supply freeing up lead as it goes to homes.”

How did the reality of the tainted water break through official denial?
Independent researchers from Virginia Tech arrived to test Flint’s water. Their findings, from hundreds of samples, found widespread lead contamination. There is no safe level for lead in the water, but the EPA puts a limit at 15 parts per billion. It classifies water tainted above 5,000 ppb as hazardous waste. Virginia Tech researchers found samples with lead contamination as high as 13,200 ppb. The researcher’s bottom line, released in late August: “FLINT HAS A VERY SERIOUS LEAD IN WATER PROBLEM.”

The denials by state officials finally faded in September 2015, after a doctor testing children’s blood in Flint revealed that the rate of observed lead poisoning had nearly doubled. 

But wasn’t the water supply switched back months ago? Why is this still a crisis?
Indeed, in early October 2015, Gov. Snyder made the call to switch Flint’s water back to Detroit’s system at a cost of $12 million, much of it paid for by the state. Flint residents were offered water filters by the county.

But the lead levels are still too high. In December 2015, citing “lead levels [that] remain well above the federal action level of 15 parts per billion in many homes,” Flint’s new mayor declared a state of emergency.

As the Department of Justice began to investigate the crisis in early January, Gov. Snyder issued an emergency declaration at the state level. He called in the National Guard to begin distributing bottled water. 

On January 16, the White House declared a federal state of emergency in Michigan and will provide “water, water filters, water filter cartridges, water test kits, and other necessary related items.”

How many kids have been affected?
State health officials say that every child under six in Flint should now be considered lead-exposed. Census data suggests that’s close to 9,000 children.

When will Flint’s water be safe to drink again?
Nobody knows.