In Boston? Don't drink the water!
Dan Abel wrote:
> In article >,
> Janet Baraclough > wrote:
>
>> The message >
>> from "Jean B." > contains these words:
>
>>> Is hot tap water hot enough to kill bacteria? What temperature
>>> would that have to be?
>> The question is, how hot does the water get in your water heater. The
>> answer to that is on its temperature gauge.
>
> I don't think they have those here in the US. It isn't hard to use an
> instant read thermometer to measure the temperature of the water coming
> out of the faucet, though.
>
>> If you think it's not hot enough , turn it up.
>
> Yup.
>
>> You already rely on your tap hot water to kill bacteria every day,
>> in personal washing, laundry, housecleaning etc.
>
> Soap kills the germs, and washing removes them. The hot water makes the
> soap work better.
>
> The cite I gave earlier in the thread says you need a temperature of 70C
> (158F) for 30 minutes to reliably kill germs. The warning instructions
> on the side of my water heater say that it takes 1/2 second to cause 2nd
> and 3rd degree burns on adult skin at 160F.
>
Noted. I may try this when my daughter isn't home. BUT now I
gather they were treating the "pond water" after the first day, so
the fact that my daughter took a shower yesterday may not have led
to the contamination of the hot water heater.
The directions we got were to run the cold water for about a
minute--you know, until, the water changes temperature and is
coming from outside. We were supposed to run the hot water full
blast for 15-30 minutes, depending on the size of our hot water
heaters.
--
Jean B.
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