Colorado farm town water contaminated with marijuana

The small farm-ranch town of Hugo near the Colorado-Kansas border is giving people bottled water because its supply is contaminated with THC, the element of marijuana that gets people stoned.

The Denver Post said residents – there are about 730 – have been told not to even give tap water to their pets.

Numerous tests have been conducted with varying results. No one has become ill, said Capt. Michael Yowell of the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office.

“I wouldn’t be doing my job for my community if we just wrote this off,” Yowell said.

The FBI has joined the probe.

There are possibilities someone had polluted a well, and one well has been closed. Marijuana is legal in Colorado and many people grow it.

Mayor Tom Lee told the Post: “We’ll figure it out. It just blew my mind.”

THC is the cannabis ingredient that gets people high. CBD, also from weed, is widely used in medicines.

Hugo, a former stage coach stop that was built near the western-moving railroadline, is not far from the junction of state roads 287 and 59 about 75 miles from Burlington, Kansas on Interstate 70.

It is about 200 miles to the Rocky Mountains to the west, and they are visible on some days. It is 160 miles to Denver.
The area can be hell during blizzards that sometimes close the interstate. The elevation is 5,039 feet with few trees.

Tourists rarely visit the area.

One winter I had to go off the Interstate because it was closed by snow. The only lights were in Hugo. I was wearing a sweatshirt that said “Alcatraz Swim Team.”

The very gracious man running the gas pump said: “What’s it like there in Alactraz?"