Water Doctors

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Every day the Africa Mercy crew and patients consume 60 metric tons (15,850 gal) of water. This is the equivalent to 60,000 bottles of water, one liter each. That’s a lot of water. The water-men test, treat, filter and test the water again until it is safe for drinking. Last week five deck crew and two Deck Officers attended the Basic Water Safety course. The twelve hours course was delivered by Shirley Quinn, the water engineer responsible for the water and sewage plant at the Mercy Ships International Support Center in Texas. Ibrahim Bangura, one of the course participants said, “The course expanded my knowledge and brought me to a higher level of understanding about how to treat water and make it safe to drink”. The crew who takes care of the water are called water-man, but after I saw all the tests and treatment they do to make the ships water read for consumption I’m calling them ‘Water Doctors’.


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