KIMBALLTON, Iowa — Officials with the City of Kimballton, Friday afternoon, said that the City notified the Iowa DNR Field Office in Atlantic, that during the effort to refill the water tower from Tuesday’s incident, sodium permanganate was overfed, resulting in pink water throughout the distribution system.

Sodium permanganate is used as an oxidizing agent in drinking water and wastewater treatment to help with iron and manganese removal. The pink water will be flushed out of the distribution system in phases once levels in the water tower return to normal.

The City issued a public notice for manganese health advisory level exceedance on April 11th. Sample results have been received and are below the health advisory level, but the sodium permanganate overfeed will require a new public notice to be issued for adolescents and adults. The bottled water advisory will remain in place until manganese samples can be collected and results are below the health advisory level (HAL).

Although manganese is a common, naturally-occurring mineral found in rocks, soil, groundwater, and surface water, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has developed a health advisory level for manganese in drinking water of 0.3 mg/L, which is intended to be protective of lifetime exposure for the general population. Further, the US EPA recommends that the general population should not ingest water with manganese concentrations greater than 1 mg/L for more than a total of 10 days per year.

Please do not give the water to adults and children of any age. Adults, children, and infants who drink water containing manganese above the health advisory level may be associated with adverse health effects.