WEIRTON — While many area residents and businesses continue to be affected by a lack of water service, the community’s major health care facility is operating as normally as possible.

According to officials with WVU Medicine-Weirton Medical Center, patient care and operations at the hospital have continued without interruptions.

“Thanks to outside water sourcing from Water Transport of Hopedale, hospital operations are normal,” notes a statement released Thursday morning by hospital officials. “We will continue to utilize Water Transport’s tanker trucks and thank them for their prompt attention to our needs assuring there’s no impact on patient care or operations”

WVU Medicine-Weirton Medical Center is a 238-bed acute care hospital with more than 1,400 employees.

In addition to a staff of primary care physicians, the hospital offers more than two dozen specialty services, including audiology, dermatology, endocrinology, breast care, cardiac rehabilitation, home health, kidney disease/nephrology, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedic and joint care, physical rehabilitation, urology, respiratory care, and wound care.

All of Weirton remains under a mandatory water conservation order, with the Weirton Heights area of the city also under a boil order.

The conservation order was issued Dec. 18 following a series of water line breaks in the city, with a city-wide boil order issued Dec. 27 after a break in a 12-inch main water line on Walnut Street led to outages throughout the city.

Problems were compounded by the failure of a primary pump at the water treatment plant and the refurbishment of a well as part of ongoing upgrades at the plant lowering the rate the water system is able to be filled.

Weirton water officials had an agreement with Cleveland-Cliffs to tap into the company’s internal water system located at its idled facilities in Weirton to assist; however, a recent line break in that system put a halt to the arrangement.

The city-wide boil order was partially lifted on Dec. 31, with a full lift of the order announced Jan. 3.

However, on Jan. 22, officials notified residents water tank levels had been diminished, and some areas of the city would experience low to no water pressure. A new, ongoing boil order for Weirton Heights was issued Jan. 23.

Monday night, officials announced the city’s water system might not be stabilized until Feb. 10, with much of the focus remaining on higher elevations in the Weirton Heights area.

The conservation order is expected to remain in place for much of February.