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Animal shelter struggling to provide water during boil order

CLAY COUNTY, Ind. (WTHI) – Following a water main break in Clay County, a local animal shelter is struggling to provide water for the animals they house.

Crews responded to a water main break on U.S. 40. Monday night. While it has since been repaired, affected areas have been placed under a boil order. This includes the communities of Knightsville, Harmony, Center Point, Carbon and Brazil.

While it’s an inconvenience for residents, it’s also putting a strain on the Clay County Humane Society.

“Water is a necessity, we have to have that for our animals on a daily basis,” said Abby Tague, director.

Tague says they currently have 60 animals in the shelter. Daily, she says, they manage to go through anywhere between 60 to 100 gallons of water. When she learned about the boil order Tuesday morning, she says the shelter went into emergency mode.

“We called businesses, local stores here,” said Tague, “Majority of them had already sold out or there wasn’t enough to accommodate what we needed.”

With little luck locally, shelter staff have gone outside of county lines to purchase water for their animals. They’ve purchased gallons from surrounding stores, as well as picked up water from residents who donated their own gallons. The shelter does not have access to boiling water themselves.

“We appreciate everything the local businesses are doing for us, local residents and even outside of the county,” said Tague, “The outreach has already been awesome and we only found out about the water situation this morning.”

While the boil order is placed until further notice, Tague says they are trying to make it work as they are uncertain of when it will be lifted. Tague says they were told it could last for about seven days and that’s subject to change if necessary.

“It’s scary for us,” said Tague, “Not knowing the uncertainty wears on us a little bit, to know it could be seven days, it could be longer.”

In the meantime, shelter staff continue to ask for help from the community during the wait.

A post on the Clay County Humane Society said,

CCHS is in need of some help. We need water to water all of the animals here. We have several 1 gal jugs if you have a well and could fill them for us or we could come fill them. Brazil is pretty much sold out of gallons of water. We run to walmart on 46 and got some for today but don’t know how long we will be on a boil water advisory. Any help would be appreciated!!!”

Anyone able to donate water can contact the humane society at (812) 446-5126.