Spirit Liberia: Rock Hill Well

I want to give a quick update on the Rock Hill well project. For those of you who are new to this blog, I will give you a little background info.! Rock Hill is a very desperate community in Liberia. It is referred to as the Rock Hole. Basically it is a rocky area where they are harvesting rock by hand. Many who live there “crush rock” by hand for a living, including young children. This community has not had access to clean fresh water locally for a very long time. This has been a huge problem as many people have had to walk very long distances to get drinking water. Spirit Liberia has been working for many months to get a well drilled in Rock Hill. As you can imagine with such a rocky area drilling for water is a difficult task. This well is proving to be much more expensive and difficult than we had anticipated! About a month ago, we were able to get the well drilled and the water was flowing! The community was so happy and full of joy. As time has progressed, we noticed that the water was coming out clear, but after sitting for some time turned very orange. People were also complaining about the taste and smell of the water. We have had the water company come out to assess the problem a few times and have tried treating the well with chlorine tablets to help clear up the rust. This has not been working and while I was there we took some water for testing. Unfortunately the water has such a high Iron content that the Ministry of Health has declared it “unfit for human consumption”. So, we press on! We are working with the well driller to come up with a solution. It looks as if we will have to purchase a new lot and re-drill at least 500 feet from where this first pump was installed. This Iron is coming from deep in the ground and there doesn’t seem to be a way to avoid it if we re-drill in this same area. As you can imagine, this has been a huge disappointment for us and the community there in Rock Hill. This project is now costing us much more than what was originally raised. Please pray with us as we press on to bring the water of life to this desperate community!

Previous water sources in the community