Mobile, Alabama Water Outage Today

Mobile tap water system, by the numbers

Mobile Area Water & Sewer System is the water system EPA lists for Mobile, serving about 279,000 people. Customers know it as Mobile Area Water & Sewer System (MAWSS); the name on your bill is the one to call.

Where Mobile's tap water comes from

Mobile drinks surface water. Mobile Area Water & Sewer System draws it from Mobile River Bucks, J.B. Converse Lake (Stickney), and J.B. Converse Lake (Myers) and treats it before it goes into the distribution system. Treatment points named in EPA's facility list include E.M. Stickney Treatment Facility and H.E. Myers Treatment Facility. After treatment the water is held in 15 storage tanks and reservoirs and pushed uphill by 13 pump facilities; that storage is the buffer that keeps taps running for a few hours after a pump or main fails.

The outage angle. Because the water is drawn from open surface sources, it has to be filtered and disinfected continuously. A plant problem therefore hits everyone at once, unlike a main break, which only dries up the blocks on either side of the damaged pipe. EPA lists 2 emergency connections to neighboring systems, which can be opened to move water across a boundary during a failure.

Why the water goes out in Mobile

These are the causes that match the record for Mobile, listed roughly in order of how much they matter here.

• Flooding and heavy rain. NOAA logged 103 flood, flash flood and heavy rain reports in Mobile County from 2015 through 2026, and 13 days a year bring an inch of rain or more. High water can wash out the ground under buried pipe, flood pump stations and push treatment plants past their limits, which is why boil notices so often follow a flood.
• Tropical storms and hurricanes. Storm surge, flooding and multi-day power cuts are the main threat to treatment plants and pump stations in Alabama. Utilities in the region routinely issue precautionary boil notices after a storm, even where nothing is found in the water.
• Storm-driven power loss. Thunderstorm wind, hail and tornado reports in Mobile County number 229 since 2015. Pump stations and treatment plants that depend on Alabama Power run on the electric grid, so a storm that downs power lines can lower water pressure even when no pipe is damaged.
• Construction and third-party damage. A backhoe or boring crew that hits a main is among the most common reasons a single block goes dry without warning. Utilities handle those the same way as any break: isolate, repair, flush.
• One-address problems. A closed valve, a meter swap or a failed regulator can leave a single house dry. Compare notes with a neighbor first; if they have water too, start with your own plumbing.

Mobile weather and water-main stress, 2015–2025

Weather stress on the water system in Mobile is moderate: freezes and heat waves are limited, so breaks tend to follow age, ground movement and construction more than weather.

Because this is gridded reanalysis data, individual hot and cold days can read a few degrees off what the airport recorded. The day counts and yearly patterns are the useful part.

Mobile boil water notices and EPA compliance record

EPA lists 1 health-based violation for Mobile Area Water & Sewer System since 2015. It also lists 24 monitoring or reporting entries that are about paperwork rather than water quality, such as a missed sample or a late report.

Most recent health-based entries:

• July 2023: Drinking water above the legal limit for total trihalomethanes It is marked resolved.

When Mobile loses pressure after a break or a failed test, Mobile Area Water & Sewer System (MAWSS) asks affected customers to boil water for drinking and cooking. The notice ends only after samples come back clean, which usually takes one to two days after service returns, and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) supervises the process.

Lead service lines and old plumbing in Mobile

The most recent 90th-percentile lead result filed for Mobile Area Water & Sewer System is 1.5 ppb (2025). The federal action level is 15 ppb, so that result is far from the limit.

38.9% of occupied homes in Mobile were built before 1970, and lead service lines and solder stayed legal until the federal ban in 1986. After any outage that disturbs the pipes, run the cold tap 30 seconds to 2 minutes before drinking, and ask Mobile Area Water & Sewer System (MAWSS) about its lead service line inventory.

How long a water outage lasts in Mobile

A crew that arrives at an ordinary main break in Mobile usually needs 4 to 8 hours to isolate the pipe, dig, repair, flush and restore pressure. Large transmission mains, deep pipes and breaks under busy streets can take a day or more. With 279,000 people on the system, a break on a main that feeds a whole district can leave thousands of homes dry at once, and crews may close valves several blocks away to isolate it.

For a break that affects many customers, Mobile Area Water & Sewer System (MAWSS) usually posts an estimated restoration time. When you call, ask the dispatcher what the crew has told them.

How much water to keep on hand in Mobile

The average household in Mobile has about 2.4 people, so FEMA's minimum of one gallon per person per day comes to roughly 7 gallons for three days and 34 gallons for two weeks.

• Do not forget the water heater: the tank holds roughly 30 to 50 gallons you can drink after it is switched off and allowed to cool.
• If a planned shutoff or storm is coming, fill the tub and some buckets for flushing toilets and washing; keep drinking water in clean sealed containers.

Water systems near Mobile, side by side

Water outage pages for nearby cities

Gulfport, MS · New Orleans, LA · Montgomery, AL · Jackson, MS