By Gerardo R. Partido
Variety News Staff

THE weekend didn’t turn out so bad for southern residents after all as the Navy completed upgrades to its Fena water treatment plant two days ahead of schedule.
Earlier, it was feared that southern areas would be facing a three-day water outage as the Navy’s original schedule called for an outage starting Friday, Feb. 2, through Sunday, Feb. 4.
But Capt. Kenneth Branch, commanding officer of the U.S. Naval Facilities Engineering Command Marianas, said the resourcefulness of the Navy’s contractors and the adoption of water conservation measures led to the completion of the upgrade ahead of time.
“Due to the ingenuity and innovation of the project contractor, Dick Pacific, the expert plant operations and coordination conducted by DZSP21, and the superb efforts of all customers to conserve water during this outage, we were able to complete the recent improvements in one fourth of the time. This was an excellent example of everyone working together as one community,” Branch said.
According to the Navy’s public affairs office, the scheduled outage was necessary to facilitate Navy Water Treatment Plant upgrades, which will improve treatment processes, and modernize process control instrumentation, resulting in better, more reliable water service to Navy customers.
The Navy worked closely with the Guam Waterworks Authority and village mayors during the renovations to minimize negative impacts and to ensure residents are promptly notified of upcoming water outages.