Two Days of Bottled Water Distribution Gave Relief To More Than 1,600 Families

From 2-7 p.m. (not including prep-time and take-down), 27 members of the community on Tuesday and 31 on Wednesday, including police, fire, , team members and volunteers, loaded cars with free cases of bottled water.

The Point of Distribution (POD) event was held after the overwhelming power outages from Tropical Storm Irene made it impossible for many residents, especially those with well water, to obtain clean water to drink.

On both days vehicles began lining up behind shortly before 2 p.m. at a checkpoint where the residents would tell POD workers how many people were in their family and be given a ticket with that number. The vehicles would then proceed to one of six distribution spots staffed with POD workers who would load the number of cases in for them, one for each family member.

Central Coventry Fire Captain Bill Hall randomly timed groups of ten cars, and reported that from the time the family's ticket was given to a POD worker to when the vehicle pulled away, the transactions never took longer than three-and-a-half minutes, with most being much shorter.

"We have a heck of a system going here," said Hall on Wednesday afternoon. "We're a well-oiled machine."

According to Lt. John MacDonald who managed the event with Hall, a total of 1,605 vehicles passed through the POD over the two-day span. He also reported that 2,467 cases of water were distributed on Tuesday and another 3,826 cases on Wednesday.