Initial results showing elevated lead in the water of some Yellowknife schools arrived in January, the NWT government says, with follow-up results arriving in early April.
As far as the GNWT knows, school drinking water in the territory has never before been tested for lead as part of a coordinated program, the Department of Education, Culture and Employment stated on Wednesday morning.
That means there appears to be no way of knowing how long this was an issue before the GNWT began a pilot program “to proactively test and monitor for lead in school drinking water” in November 2024.
The City of Yellowknife’s water in general is not under scrutiny. The city’s water is regularly tested and no recent issues have been reported. Instead, the issue appears confined to the pipes and water distribution systems within William McDonald School and Range Lake North School.
Both schools are now using bottled water for drinking and cooking, the YK1 school district told parents on Monday.
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The school district said in a letter that the current results represented a “single sample” and more tests would be done.
But ECE, in its Wednesday statement to Cabin Radio, suggested at least two sets of tests had already taken place in each of the affected schools.
“Initial test results were received on January 22, 2025,” the department stated, adding the results were enough to trigger “a second round of testing at locations where lead levels exceeded the recommended guidelines.”
“Results from this second round were received on April 4,” an ECE spokesperson continued.
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The spokesperson said those results needed further assessment before parents were ultimately notified on May 26. Department staff and the Office of the Chief Public Health Officer had been “working together to interpret the results, determine appropriate next steps, and plan for additional sampling to fully understand the extent of the issue,” ECE stated.
“Parents were informed once sufficient information had been gathered to provide a clear and accurate update. That said, further testing is still required to confirm actual risk level within those locations.”
Results still ‘not conclusive’
A third Yellowknife school facility – the NJ Macpherson School annex (not the main school) – had an elevated lead reading during an initial test, ECE also disclosed on Wednesday, but that reading dropped to within acceptable levels when a follow-up test was carried out.
“Overall, 44 NWT schools had testing performed this academic year and the majority returned levels below the maximum acceptable concentration,” the department stated. (Asked if any of the territory’s schools did not receive testing, the department said it would provide more detail shortly.)
The results so far at Range Lake North School and William McDonald School “are not conclusive and further testing is needed before making judgments about potential exposure impacts,” ECE’s statement stressed.
“As a precaution, ECE recommended to YK1 that the two schools showing elevated levels of lead move to providing alternative sources of drinking and cooking water until further testing has been completed and more information is known.”
Those two schools will now receive what ECE called a “more fulsome round of testing which will test all drinking water and food preparation sources within the schools.”
“We do not yet know what may be causing the elevated tests, and will need to review the results of the wide-scale site testing,” the department stated.
“Lead can enter drinking water when plumbing materials that contain lead corrode, especially where the water has high acidity or low mineral content that corrodes pipes and fixtures. The most common sources of lead in drinking water are lead pipes, faucets, and fixtures.”
