Amid rocky roadways, unreliable public transport, and lack of proper lighting in certain areas, the residents of St Lucy are plagued with a common affliction– discolored, unsightly water.
Their fervent hope, they say, is to turn on their taps and catch a drink of pure, cold, clear, and clean Bajan water. However, this simple act, for them, has become a distant memory and a privilege they can no longer enjoy, as in St Lucy, brown water dripping from taps has become the norm.
The people of the north admit that while they still pay their bills, what flows through their pipes is far from refreshing. Not only is it rust-coloured, it stains basins, sours laundry, and reminds them how far they’ve drifted from normal.
Across the parish, plastic bottles bear testament to their cry.
Empty five-litre jugs line doorsteps, while cases of purchased water stack in kitchens. Some residents repurpose soft-drink bottles to store water caught from water tankers. Each one is proof of patience, a plastic archive of unmet expectation.
At Hope Road, Andrea Toppin lifted one of hers toward the light. Inside, the liquid shimmered a dull amber.
“For the past 10 years I have been dealing with brown water,” she told Barbados TODAY during a recent visit to the parish.
“Every day when I turn on my tap the water is brown. Sometimes you go to wash your face or brush your teeth, and you just stop, because you can’t.”
She emptied garbage bags full of bottles into a heap on her porch in an effort to drive home her point.
“I buy so much water, I can’t tell you the amount of bottles that I have stored up from buying water. And still, you get a water bill every month. You still have to pay a water bill, though there is not much you can do with the water coming from the faucet,” she said.
“Sometimes I say the only thing that my water can do is maybe water my plants, nothing else, so it’s a real, real struggle.”
Noting her hesitation to use the water to do laundry, Toppin said it often leaves stains on whites, and sometimes colored clothing.
“My son does chef work and I can’t wash his jackets in the water. I put the water in the machine and it looks dark. Sometimes I take a chance and all the clothes get messed up. So it’s a real, real struggle on an everyday basis,” she added.
Beyond the color, the resident bemoaned what she described as a foul odor.
“I can’t pinpoint and say what type of scent it is, but it smells kind of sourish. Even to the point, like, sometimes I wash my clothes, even put Sauvetel in it, but then when you… smell the clothes, there’s this funny smell,” she said.
“I am praying and hoping that the work that they say they’re doing on it will actually come so that we can have better, because I don’t know how long householders can actually go on with water like this.”
Meanwhile, 70-year-old Zelma Holder remembers when the water ran clear enough to drink straight from the pipe. Now, she says, “Sometimes it’s worse than cooking oil… brown, brown. You can’t wash white clothes, you can’t even feel good cooking with it.”
She keeps her bottles in the fridge and shakes her head when outsiders question whether the stories are exaggerated.
“If people hear I from St Lucy, they ask: ‘How wunna living with brown water?’ But it real.”
In Connell Town, Marsha Springer has learned to ration, her story matching those of residents in neighbouring communities.
“We can’t drink the water. It’s not consumable,” she said. “I soak white clothes in tank water. The tap water still stains, even coloured clothes.”
She showed several large bottles stacked neatly against a wall, which she said is her family’s rotation of storage.
Farther east in Northumberland, one resident compared the water to “clay.”
“[It] smell bad, you can’t drink it. You long to go to your pipe and catch a cup of water and drink.”
The residents unanimously say they hope for the day that they are able to get what they continue to pay for.
The brown-water problem in St Lucy isn’t new. Back in 2021, the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) identified aging iron mains as a growing headache.
In February 2023, officials linked the discolouration to silt and sediment entering the Allendale source, worsened by frequent breaks on decades-old pipes.
By September 2024, after heavy rains and flooding, the Ministry of Health issued a boil-water advisory for several districts in St Lucy, warning that increased chlorination could alter taste but was needed to keep bacteria at bay.
Two months later, residents were given the “all-clear.” Yet the taps still ran orange, prompting another round of outrage.
The issue escalated into Parliament in March 2025, when Minister in the Ministry of Finance Ryan Straughn announced a $32 monthly credit – the minimum water charge – for households in St Lucy and parts of St Peter “for up to one year, or until the problem is resolved.”
He acknowledged the burden and promised an aggressive programme to replace mains across Checker Hall, Josey Hill, Maycock’s, Broomfield, Hope Bridge Road and Cave Hill, along with new filtration equipment for the north.
When Barbados TODAY visited the area, you could see the struggle etched into everyday life. Along nearby roads, trenches ran like scars across the marl, part of ongoing mains-replacement works. Fresh coils of pipe waited beside ditches, and heavy equipment sat idling under the sun, even as workmen congregated in a nearby building exchanging laughs.
The work is visible and necessary but for several households, the water itself still tells a different story.
Public confidence took another blow over the weekend, when BWA acting CEO Christopher Mapp stressed that despite its colour, the water was safe to drink.
“Would I feel comfortable drinking it? Yes,” he told reporters during a media brief last Saturday.
He said laboratory results met World Health Organisation standards for heavy metals and bacteria, and that discolouration came from sediment disturbed during ongoing works.
His assurance, however, landed badly among residents who bemoan not only the sight but the stench of their tap water and wider society who sympathises with them.
Some called the comment “disrespectful” and “out of touch.” On social media and at community meetup spots, the refrain was sharp: “Let him come and drink it himself.”
The BWA explained that about $20 million has been invested in mains replacement (including $7 million since April), and that a filtration plant at Alleynedale and a containerised desalination unit at Hope Plantation are scheduled for completion by early 2026.
The Authority maintains that the brown hue poses no health risk.
Still, for households like Toppin’s, faith in test results is thin.
“How can we drink the water and it’s still coming out orange? How can that be safe for consumption? Not only orange, but then it has a smell as well.
“So, to me personally, it was like insulting our intelligence, thinking like we are stupid people. You want to come and tell us that water is safe for consumption, and then when we turn on the pipe the water is dirty. I mean, how anybody in the world can drink water like that?” she questioned.
Every coping strategy has a cost. Bottled water eats into the grocery bill, laundromat trips multiply. Children learn early that the kitchen tap is off-limits. For older residents with mobility issues, collecting water from tankers is a physical trial. When the tanker misses its rotation, households wait or borrow.
BWA engineers insist the fix is on its way, citing a 100-kilometre replacement programme across the island’s most fragile pipes.
The Ministry of Finance reports that monthly credits continue to flow to affected customers, totalling roughly $150 000 each month – a small concession against years of frustration.
But residents say the real relief will come only when the water clears.
Inside her yard, Andrea Toppin glanced at her water bottles and sighed: “We ain’t ungrateful.”
“Water is still coming through the pipe, but at the end of the day, you still can’t do nothing with the water.”
shannamoore@barbadostoday.bb
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