SLAYTON -- No snow, no teacher in-service day, no holiday, but the students at Murray County Central will get a break today from school just the same, thanks to the city of Slayton and some water valves.
There was already a planned water service outage for houses and businesses east of Maple Avenue, but while preparing to hook up a new main, a valve broke.
"So now we have to shut down the whole town," said Slayton City Clerk Cathy Magnus. "This was just unexpected."
While this may be a major inconvenience for area businesses, the students at MCC probably won't mind much. But how will businesses manage without water for a couple of hours?
"I suppose the way they always have," Magnus said. "They just manage."
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At the Murray County Medical Center and Clinic, a plan is in place, according to Chief Engineer Arl Weinrebe.
"We fill pails and tubs," he said. "We can't send our patients home, so we make arrangements. We order porta-potties for visitors and staff."
The medical center was already scheduled to be without water, so they had made plans. No surgeries were scheduled for today.
"The city is really good about calling us and notifying us," Weinrebe said Monday. "It was scheduled to be shut down today, but they are working around our surgery schedule."
At Jim's Market, manager Dean Ackerman said the water shutdown won't affect them much beyond the water machine, which uses city water.
Dayton Westra, owner of the Hub Drive-In, plans to stay open during the shut-down by filling pails.
"We all just deal with it," Weinrebe said. "It is odd that it happened twice in one month, but last time they said it could take all day. It was shut down at 8 a.m., and back up at 11 a.m."
