UPDATE at 2:10 p.m. on 11/20/25
Early afternoon on Thursday, the City of Cape Girardeau gave an update on the temporary boil water advisory.
City communications stated that the tap water is safe to drink and use normally. The boil water advisory for the affected downtown Cape Girardeau ended shortly before 2 p.m. Thursday. Officials say that testing confirmed water quality following Wednesday's drop in system pressure, which came after construction crews hit a main and then caused pump failure at the water plant.
Projects tied to the Cape Girardeau Water Bill, which passed earlier this year, are already underway at the plants. Work includes a line feed project and upgrades to filter galleries to improve flow.
These efforts are just the start of a larger 15-year plan that’s still in the engineering phase and will take years to roll out. Funding will take time to build, but planning is moving forward, says J.J. Ridings, Local Manager of Alliance Water Resources.
“We’ve got projects going on at the plants right now,” Ridings said. “There’s a line feed project, and we’ve redone parts of the system for that. We’ve also done a lot of work rehabbing filters and galleries to push more flow through the plant. But these are smaller pieces of the big 15-year plan.”
You can learn more about Cape Girardeau's water system upgrades here.
Original story
As construction continues along Broadway, water delivery has affected some downtown Cape Girardeau businesses and residences.
The precautionary boil water advisory was issued by the city on Wed. Nov. 19th, and is in effect for about 14,000 addresses in Cape Girardeau until 9:15 a.m. Friday, Nov. 21. You can see affected properties on their map and find a full list of addresses.
There’s no known contamination, but water safety tests take 24 to 48 hours to confirm. The advisory was issued after a drop in water pressure.
If you’ve signed up for alerts, you’ll get a text, call, or email. Registration is available at https://cityofcape.org/getalerts.
Until the advisory is lifted, water customers are urged to use bottled water or boil tap water for 3 to 5 minutes and let it cool before using it for drinking, washing dishes, rinsing produce, making ice, or brushing teeth.
The city says a construction incident caused the temporary pressure drop and triggered the advisory. Crews are working to restore normal operations quickly and safely.
Earlier this year, in mid-September, the Cape Girardeau Water Plant experienced an electrical failure affecting one of the three main power feeds to the facility, and triggering a boil water advisory. The situation was contained and fixed quickly within one day.
