Boil water advisory issued for Kannapolis area residents after E. coli is detected in drinking water

KANNAPOLIS, N.C. – Students in Kannapolis went home early Friday, following a boil water advisory. Leaders say E. Coli was found in the city’s drinking water. Officials say the issues appears temporary. Crews are flushing and treating the system. People who live in the area are urged to boil water for at least one minute before cooking, drinking, or brushing teeth.

Free bottled water is available at the Kannapolis Fire Department Logistics building. Kannapolis resident Larissa McCorkle says, “How are we gonna get through this? Your cooking, washing dishes, the baths. Everything runs on water.”

Kannapolis Fire Dept. Chief Tracy Winecoff says, “We want to make sure that all of our citizens had access to drinking water. We organized this through our existing stock of pallets of water that we keep for our firefighters.”

The Kannapolis Fire Department will be handing out water again on Saturday. City officials hope to have the issue resolved this weekend.