The water in the Dupont Circle fountain was red on Monday. When contacted earlier Monday morning, a National Park Service spokesperson said the agency was sending a team to investigate.
They found that the scarlet hue is due to a red, powdered dye that was added to the water in the fountain, according to NPS spokesperson Brian Hall. The dye has mostly been filtered out now.
“Our Maintenance and Resource Management Crews have looked at the fountain,” Hall says. “Our crews are going to drain the fountain today (it takes a while to drain it completely) then tomorrow we will clean and refill it.”
Dupont Circle fountain is an odd shade of rust/orange this morning pic.twitter.com/qKcDqMujH8
— The Pope of Dupont Circle (@PopeDupontCircl) July 16, 2018
The reddish hue caught the attention of DC residents, local blogs, and social media users, who shared photos via Twitter and Reddit.
