City Water Tower part implodes during maintenance, water is safe for consumption

The First Street water tower in Bemidji was reportedly damaged from an implosion Tuesday.

According to a release, the center water riser column imploded while city utility department staff was performing maintenance.

Sections of First Street were closed for about two hours yesterday.

City Manager Nate Mathews says the water tower is structurally sound and they don’t anticipate any major impacts to the city’s water service while the issue is resolved.


Larissa Donovan was the News Director for the stations of Paul Bunyan Broadcasting and has been, almost without interruption, since Election Day 2016, through July 2023. She covered all the beats in north-central Minnesota, such as local government, crime, education, environment and social issues. She studied communications at Bemidji State University. You can follow along with Larissa's live tweets of meetings and events on Twitter!


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